


Close Quarters

by duustbunny



Category: Star Trek: Alternate Original Series (Movies)
Genre: Awkwardness, Eating Disorders, Enemies to Friends to Lovers, Implied/Referenced Rape/Non-con, Khirk, M/M, Misunderstandings, Non-Graphic Violence, Roommates, Slow Burn, Slow-building Relationship, Starfleet made them do it
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-01-13
Updated: 2014-02-24
Packaged: 2018-01-08 15:04:06
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 32
Words: 38,848
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1134090
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/duustbunny/pseuds/duustbunny
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Being on not-so-good terms with his Chief Engineer was something Jim should have, in retrospect, made a priority to resolve. Now he found himself with the augment he hated most in the whole universe stuck not only in his personal quarters, but also in his head. Can this actually lead to a change of perspective, or is there no hope for them at all?</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. The Mandatory Request (Prologue)

**Author's Note:**

> This fic originated as a response to a STID Kink Meme prompt:  
> " _My personal Khirk pet peeve is when the author has them falling into bed by the second chapter, because if you watch STID closely... they hate each other!_  
>  _The fandom needs more long, slow-building Khirk fics. Hopefully some awesome anon will agree with me_  
>  _Bonuses (all the things I like):Tarsus IV, past non-con + present "issues", the famous choking scene from Star Trek 2009 re-done for Khirk, UST and misunderstandings and awkwardness, all in large quantities_ "
> 
> Apart from everything the OP wanted, I hope I managed to include all the classic Star Trek stuff we all know and love, too. Unlikely coincidences and crazy last-minute saves? Check. Alien substances that cause convenient behavioral changes in the characters? Check. Indiscriminate killing of redshirts? Check. Nonsensical pseudo-scientific gibberish? Check.
> 
> This fic is complete. 
> 
> \--

Having Khan on board the Enterprise made Jim very uneasy, whether the man was inside the brig or outside. But outside was definitely worse.

It was Jim’s own fault, though. He was the one who had gone all soft after learning that the augment had volunteered his super blood when Bones told him they needed it to save Jim’s life. And then, of course, Jim had given a far too kind testimony at the trial _aaand_ , because that was somehow not enough, he requested rehabilitation for Khan instead of “inhumanly freezing him against his will like a piece of non-replicated meat, Your Honor”. _Gah_. Death had messed with his head, he supposed. How couldn’t he see that Khan had donated his blood not out of the goodness of his heart (pfft!) but because he needed to play ‘who’s a good boy’ once he realized he had lost his little one-man war against pretty much everyone? Unsurprisingly, Starfleet was quick to close the case and make Khan disappear in a classified rehabilitation program, away from public prisons where people could ask him or his cellmates all kinds of uncomfortable questions. Uncomfortable for Starfleet, that is.

After that, Jim forgot all about Khan’s rehab for almost a year. It was only a week before the start of the five year mission that Admiral Bowles approached him to ‘remind’ him that the last stage of Khan’s program consisted of twelve to eighteen months on board a starship serving as a civilian consultant. It wasn’t until after Jim had agreed on what an excellent idea this was that Bowles casually mentioned Khan had specifically requested to serve his parole of sorts aboard the Enterprise.

So that’s how Jim ended up with Khan and a psychotherapist on his ship, facing a year-long jolly ride full of adventures and shit before he could get rid of the extra ballast.

At least the psychotherapist was hot.

But, because he was James T. Kirk and that meant nothing ever went the easy, normal way for him, on the day they were scheduled to start their mission Scotty interrupted his lunch to announce that they were two berths short due to their unplanned participation in Khan’s rehabilitation program.

“Just put someone with me until the new cabins are built,” he had suggested. “I’ve got room.”

 _Big_ mistake. Scotty was still pissed at Khan and, by extension, at Jim (somehow that made sense in his chief engineer’s mind).

Looking back, he shouldn’t have signed the PADD without looking.


	2. The Roommate

The start of a five-year mission, turns out, requires _a lot_ of work. They were almost point six miliparsecs away from Earth and Jim was still being held hostage by Spock in the captain’s own ready room.

“It’s one a.m., Spock. For god’s sake, can’t this wait till morning?”

“If you ceased complaining, Captain, we would conclude this meeting in approximately fourteen point seventy two minutes.”

“I’m hungry.”

Spock eyed the discarded tray at the end of the desk. “You ingested nourishment at twenty-three hundred hours, Captain. I was under the impression that dinner was considered the last required meal of the day for humans.”

“Dinner? That was just a snack!”

Spock was silent as he looked at Jim with an assessing gaze that had the captain squirming uncomfortably.

“Jim,” he said after a moment. _Great._ When his First Officer switched to first names it meant things were going to get personal. “I have observed that you consume unnecessary edibles when you believe you are about to face an undesirable situation.”

Jim grunted noncommittally.

“Do you object to having Khan on board the Enterprise as a civilian consultant?”

“Spock, I object to having Khan on board the Enterprise as anything except a prisoner. No, scratch that, even as a prisoner.”

“Yet you requested for him to be assigned to your quarters.”

Jim froze. “ _What?_ ”

“I apologize, Captain. I assumed such allocation was your decision.”

No way. _No way._ “Scotty assigned Khan to _my_ room?”

“The berth assignment carries your signature.”

“Fuck. I guess that should teach me not to sign things without reading them first, huh?”

“That is a valuable lesson, Captain. One that you should undoubtedly have learned before being given your own commission.”

Jim sighed, rubbing his hands over his face as if that would wake him up from this horrible nightmare. “At least tell me his therapist gets to bunk with me too.”

“Doctor Abigail Johnson has been assigned to Lieutenant Ryxkreng’s quarters.”

“Ryxkreng. Lucky he.”

“She.”

“Oh. Sorry.”

“Lieutenant Ryxkreng joined the Enterprise yesterday, replacing Lieutenant Croode’s post. Seventeen point three percent of the crew has been substituted due to the casualties that resulted from our last mission.”

Jim gritted his teeth. Seventy four people under his command had died a year ago because of Khan. Maybe not at his hands, but ultimately Khan was the reason they were dead. He felt he was betraying all of them, all of his current crew as well, by allowing that monster on board his ship again.

“We have our orders, Jim,” Spock said as if he had been reading Jim’s mind. “Khan’s evaluations have been considerably encouraging since the start of his rehabilitation program.”

“That’s bullshit, Spock.”

“Doctor Johnson believes Khan to be genuinely regretful of his actions on board the Vengeance.”

Jim had heard enough. He stood up. “That’s sufficient for today, Commander. We’ll continue this meeting tomorrow focusing on our exploratory mission. Good night.”

\--

Despite Bones’ assessment of his emotional abilities, Jim always knew exactly what he was feeling. He just played dumb sometimes.

To anyone watching their captain storming down the hallways, he would have looked furious. If asked, Jim would have said he was angry at Khan for killing so many men and women of his crew, angry at Starfleet for shoving the augment into his care for a year, angry at Spock for thinking Khan might no longer be a cold-blooded murderer.

In truth, Jim felt guilty. And if he was angry at all, it was at himself. He was the one who had made a case for Khan at his trial, the one who had requested the rehabilitation program, the one who didn’t stand up for his crew when Starfleet told him Khan would be on his ship for twelve to fucking eighteen months. Not that the amount of time made much of a difference, really. After all, it had taken Khan less than two days to plan and carry out the murder of 42 lives at the Kelvin Archives in London. Three minutes to execute seven high-ranking officers at Starfleet Headquarters, including Pike. And in San Francisco... Jim tried not to think about that; the number of deaths from the Vengeance crashing was just too large to contemplate. It didn’t even feel real.

Jim suppressed a shudder as he reached his quarters. He didn’t know how he was going to get through a whole year with that monster on board his ship, not to mention actually sleeping next to him for however long it took to finish the necessary modifications to put together a new cabin.

God, he really needed to lie down for a bit, rest his eyes. He punched in the access code and felt impossibly relieved when the doors closed behind him and the constant buzz from the hallways was finally muted. Peace, at last. He pulled at the hems of his uniform shirt and undershirt to take them both off at the same time, but he ended up with a tangle of clothes around his face and arms when he was pulling them over his head. He moved blindly into the bedroom area as he struggled to free himself.

When he managed to pull them off, he was greeted with a sight so unexpected that for a moment he thought he was hallucinating. Then he remembered the new berth arrangements and silently cursed the whole universe (and alternate universes as well, just to be sure).

Khan stood before him, dressed in grey pajamas, holding a bundle of dark clothing in his hands. His eyes momentarily flicked down Jim’s naked torso, but it was so quick Jim thought he might have imagined it.

“ _Captain._ ”

Oh no, Jim was _not_ going to put up with that tone. He might have ignored it when Khan was a prisoner last year, but now he was a fucking _guest_ on board Jim’s starship and the bastard had better appreciate that.

“I could flush you out an airlock, Khan.” He didn’t mean to say that out loud but it just slipped out.

Khan’s face immediately hardened. “I understand.”

 _Shit._ Jim quickly grabbed his own pajamas from under his pillow and ran to the bathroom.

He was not hiding.

Okay, maybe a little.

This was ridiculous, for god’s sake. These were _his_ quarters. _His_ safe haven where he could come after a long day to just chill out, or to hide from Spock, or whatever the hell he wanted. He didn’t want to sleep with one eye open and a phaser under his pillow.

He took off the rest of his clothes and stepped into the shower stall. The sonic waves made his teeth throb painfully, but a real water shower on a starship was a luxury not even the captain could treat himself to.

Okay, shower done. What else, what else... Jim looked around the bathroom and his eyes landed on the pore-opening cream. Right, shaving. He could do it now and save himself some time in the morning. Was he stalling? Perhaps. But right now the bathroom was a private place and his bedroom wasn’t, so it seemed reasonable to stay in there a while longer.

He smeared some of the cream on his face and let it sit for a moment while he set up the automatic razor. He wasn’t hungry anymore, but the need to nibble on something was driving him up the walls. Hating himself for what he was about to do, Jim opened the cabinet and pulled a protein bar from the corner. At least his revolting habit of storing food everywhere was coming in handy for once.

He quickly finished shaving and devoured the snack while he put on his pajamas. Actually having food in his mouth distracted him enough that he didn’t notice he was coming out of the bathroom until he was already in the bedroom. The sight of Khan lying down on the small cot at the foot of Jim’s own bed was what brought him back down to reality again.

The scene was just so _mundane_. Khan was stretched out on his back, eyes fixed on the ceiling, blanket up to his chest and hands folded on top of it over his stomach. He looked somewhat stiff, but on the other hand he always looked stiff, as far as Jim remembered. Granted, they had met under stressful circumstances.

Whatever. Jim didn’t need to be thinking of Khan right now. He needed to rest. It had been a long day and an even longer one awaited him in the morning. He set the alarm for six a.m. and lay down under the covers, feeling so exhausted he knew he’d be asleep in a few minutes despite sharing a room with a madman.

“Lights at zero percent.”

Neither said good night.


	3. The One-Night Stand

It took Jim a moment to figure out what had woken him. Everything was quiet. He reached out in the dark and felt around his nightstand for his communicator. Its barely lit screen indicated it was 3 a.m.. Fuck, he had only slept one hour.

He turned it off and was about to lie back down when he heard rustling noises coming from the other end of the room. It sounded as if Khan was tossing and turning in his bed. Was the augment awake? Jim strained his ears in the total darkness and barely caught a gasp, then another, then --unbelievably-- a whimper.

 _Shit_.

Jim was instantly fully conscious and alert. He got out of his bed and approached Khan’s. From up close he could hear Khan mumbling, though it was impossible to make out the words. He sat on the edge of the cot and hesitated for a second but decided against turning on the lights for the moment.

“Khan?”

No answer, just more tossing and turning and gasping and mumbling and it was driving Jim fucking insane because it just couldn’t be, there was no way this was happening, Khan was a fucking monster and monsters were never afraid, never had nightmares.

But his own instinct to help, to protect, was just too strong to ignore.

“Khan?” he tried again. It came out as a croak.

He reached out in the dark, slowly, hesitantly. He felt wide awake, but at the same time it all seemed like a dream, surreal. His hand connected softly with Khan’s face and in a fraction of a second he found himself lying on his back, legs dangling over the edge of the cot, arms held immobile over his head and neck trapped under a cold hand with an iron grip.

Jim gasped but no air could get through to his lungs. He could hear Khan’s ragged breath over the sound of his own blood rushing in his ears. He struggled to issue the command to turn on the lights but it was impossible, he couldn’t get his vocal chords to vibrate under the tight grasp on his throat. The pressure became stronger and stronger with every passing second and his neck felt like it was being excruciatingly crushed into tiny little pieces. Then the pain started to fade and Jim knew he was losing consciousness. He had to do something _now_ but he was slipping away, his mind clouded, unable to focus--

Then Khan abruptly let go and Jim slipped to the floor. He lay there, sprawled, gasping and choking. It took him what felt like ages to regain his breath. And all that time Khan was silent, unmoving.

Jim knew he was a pathetic sight right then, but he still opened his mouth and rasped out, “L-Lights at-- at twenty... percent.”

The scene before him was possibly one of the scariest things he had ever seen. The powerful augment who had just choked him to within an inch of passing out, who could snap his neck or crush his skull with minimal effort, was curled in a corner of his cot, pale as a ghost, a look of absolute terror on his face. His eyes were unfocused, pupils blown wide despite the sudden change in lighting.

It’s funny how people feel closer to each other at night, Jim thought. It’s like the dark emboldens you to do things you wouldn’t normally do, hang out with people you would detest during the day. As he sat there on the floor, regaining his breath and watching Khan do the same, Jim realized he was kind of offering quiet comfort to a cold-blooded murderer in a half-lit room at 3 a.m.. And he wasn’t even drunk.

“Are you okay?” he asked when the silence became too awkward to stand.

Khan’s eyes moved to set on Jim’s face but he didn’t say anything or even make any gesture to acknowledge that he had heard him.

Jim threw an arm over the cot and pushed himself up. “Well, I’m gonna go back to bed, I’ve got an early start tomorrow.”

No reply. He went to the water dispenser, filled a glass and downed it in three gulps. Bad idea, his throat hurt like hell. He refilled the glass, whishing he could order an apple from the replicator and actually swallow it.

“Anyway,” he continued, walking up to Khan again and offering the glass. Khan’s eyes were fixed on him. “Just... just wake me up if you need anything, okay? I don’t mind.”

Very slowly, Khan extended his hand and took the proffered glass, his fingers never brushing Jim’s, but his eyes never leaving him either. Way to make someone feel self-conscious, staring at them like that. Okay, time to make a hasty retreat. Jim moved back to his bed and lay down on his back, pulling the covers over him. Out of the corner of his eye he saw Khan drink the water and lie down too.

“Lights at zero percent.”

He spent the rest of the night staring into the dark, knowing he would hate himself the next day like the morning after a drunken one-night stand.


	4. The Evidence

As mornings after went, this was not the worst Jim had ever had. He got up, showered again, put on a fresh uniform and by the time he came out of the bathroom Khan was already gone. Huh. The man hadn’t even used the bathroom. Oh well, Jim was only happy to have him out of his hair.

People stared at him as he made his way through the hallways, then looked away when he made eye contact. He must look like shit. Probably had dark bags under his eyes the size of Saturn’s rings.

It was only when he reached the bridge that he realized something was off.

“Keptin on the... bridge,” Chekov announced, finishing the sentence in a whisper as his eyes landed on Jim’s neck.

Oh _shit_.

Jim all but ran back into the turbolift and thanked the gods when the doors closed before Spock could follow him in.

“Deck five.”

The turbolift ride and the walk to sickbay turned out to be far too short for Jim to get his thoughts sorted out, so when he knocked on his CMO’s office he still didn’t know what the hell he was doing there.

“Come in.”

Jim did, closing the door behind him. “Bones, my dear friend, how are you doing this lovely morning?”

“Dammit, Jim, what the hell do you want now? I’ve enough work to last me a lifetime already--” The doctor went quiet when at last he looked up from his desk. “Shit, Jimmy, what happened?”

A knock on the door interrupted them.

“Not now, I’m busy,” Bones yelled.

“Doctor, this is an urgent matter.” Fuck, it was Spock.

“Jim’s in here, Spock.”

Silence. Then, “May I come in, doctor?”

Bones closed his eyes and pinched the bridge of his nose. “Suit yourself.”

Spock entered the room, his eyes taking in the scene in front of him. Bones just ignored him.

“Jim, you gonna tell me what happened?”

“What do you mean, Bones?” Playing for time wasn’t his strongest suit this early in the morning.

“Don’t play dumb, kid, you’re the one who came in here with finger-shaped bruises around your neck.”

Oh. Finger-shaped bruises. “It was an accident,” he said. It was kind of true, really.

“It was Khan,” Spock supplied. Damn that traitorous Vulcan.

“What?! You got into a fight with him _already_? Couldn’t keep away for one goddamned day?”

“Khan has been assigned a berth in the captain’s quarters. It appears there was some sort of misunderstanding with Lieutenant Commander Scott.”

Bones gaped, turning back to Jim. “And you went and tried to beat the shit out of him again? Only this time he fought back, is that it?”

“I told you, it was an accident!”

“Oh, he tripped and fell on you with his arms outstretched.”

“Not exactly...”

“Captain, I will make immediate arrangements to relocate Khan.”

“No, no, Spock-- It's fine, okay? Leave it.”

“Jim,” Bones said, “it’s not fine. You never come to sickbay willingly when you’re injured.”

Jim looked at the floor, feeling sheepish. “I just wanted to borrow the dermal regenerator. People were staring so I thought my neck might be a little red from last night.”

“The neck is a delicate area, Jim. You could have internal damage that the dermal regenerator can’t fix.” He moved some papers off the biobed next to his desk and got all business. “Here, hop up and take your shirt off. Let me run some scans.”

Jim did as told while Bones gathered his instruments. Spock just stood there, like he wasn’t intruding on a personal medical examination. Jim ignored him as the doctor ran all sorts of gadgets over him.

“No brain damage. Did you pass out?”

“No.”

“You sure?”

“Yes, mom.”

“You’ve got dermal damage on your wrists too,” Bones commented casually as he pulled down Jim’s lower eyelids, peering inside.

“Yeah, I noticed those. It’s just a little redness.”

“It’s minor, yes.”

“So... how bad are the ones on my neck?”

“Check for yourself,” Bones replied, reaching into a desk drawer and pulling out an old-fashioned mirror that he probably nicked from an antiques museum or something.

Jim took it and looked at his reflection. Fuck, Bones hadn’t exaggerated. There were literally finger-shaped bruises around his neck, forming the clear shape of a hand closing around it. The bruises were horribly discolored, an ugly mix of red, purple and green.

“Well, no sign of laryngeal fractures or subconjunctival hemorrhage,” Bones announced. “Trachea is fine, too. Voice is a little raspy. From one to ten, how bad does your throat hurt?”

“Not that bad.”

“From one to ten?”

“Uh, three, I guess.”

“Had trouble swallowing this morning? What did you have for breakfast?”

“Uhh...”

“You forgot again.”

“I’ve got a lot on my mind, okay?” Jim noticed Spock was looking at him curiously so he avoided the Vulcan’s gaze.

“Stick to soft meals till tonight, okay?” Bones instructed, running a dermal regenerator over Jim’s neck and wrists. “Liquids, mashed vegetables, bread if you cut off the crust... But make sure you eat, you hear me? And try not to over-exert your vocal chords.”

Jim nodded and checked himself on the mirror once more; his bruises were no longer noticeable.

The doctor walked to the replicator and ordered a plate that he handed over to Jim. The sight of the scrambled eggs on it made the captain realize he was starving. “Thanks,” he said, devouring his breakfast while Bones fetched him a glass of water. “Hm, yeah, it does hurt a bit.”

“What the hell happened, Jim? And don’t give me that accident crap again. Khan knew what he was doing, he deliberately cut off the blood flow to your brain and stopped before he could inflict brain damage.”

“I don’t get how I bruised so easily this time, though,” Jim said, stalling. “I mean, I didn’t get marks so dark when Spock choked me.”

His first officer winced almost imperceptibly.

“That’s because Spock was mostly just holding you still. Khan was trying to get you to pass out. He pressed really hard.”

“Yeah, he did.”

“Accidentally?”

Jim shrugged. “He didn’t mean to do it.”

“Please explain to me how anyone can choke someone without meaning to.”

Jim looked up at Spock, who looked away. “I don’t know if I should tell you. It’s... personal.”

A look of horror dawned on his best friend’s face. “Oh, no. Jim, _no_. Tell me you didn’t.”

“What?” Oh... _oh_. _Hell_ no. “Bones! No! You don’t seriously think I would... _God_ , no. Khan’s a murderer, he murdered a fifth of my crew.”

“Yeah, sorry, kid.” Bones didn’t look sorry. “You’re right. But I don’t see how it can be so personal.”

Well, his friend was right. Jim didn’t have to protect Khan’s privacy. That bastard didn’t deserve it. “He was having a nightmare,” he explained. Both his friends frowned at that. “I went to wake him up, and I must have startled him because he got up and held me against the bed and... well...” He gestured at his own neck. “The lights were out, I don’t think he knew who I was or even where he was. But then he realized he had been dreaming, I guess, and he let go. And that’s pretty much it.”

No one said anything for a moment. Then Spock stood up straighter, clasped his hands behind his back and said, “Captain, I will personally reassign Khan to another cabin and in turn reassign such cabin’s current occupants so that he does not share it with any other crew members.”

Jim sighed. “No. I don’t want him to think I’m sending him away because he has nightmares.”

“Captain, from what you have just described it is clear that Khan is a danger to--”

“That’s an order Spock.”

Jim got down from the biobed and strode out of the CMO’s office, pulling on his uniform shirt on the way. Bones didn’t call after him. That was not a good sign.


	5. The Job

Jim spent the rest of the day immersing himself in work and avoiding Spock.

Their first long-term mission was to explore an as of yet uncharted section of the beta quadrant. They would reach their starting coordinates in about thirty hours, which meant Jim was running against the clock to organize all the work that had to be done. Space exploration and charting was a meticulous job that required many teams to work together in perfect synch.

And then there was also the issue of Khan. As part of Khan’s rehabilitation program, he was supposed to assist with different jobs aboard the Enterprise as required by the demands of their missions. Khan was a very smart man, with an intellect specifically engineered to be superior. Jim had experienced first-hand what that mind was capable of, having seen it processing data at warp speed and arriving at accurate conclusions with seemingly zero input.

Putting him in the cartography team would be a waste. And there was no way the augment could work in Engineering with Scotty... Jim might as well order the detonation of their warp core without ejecting it. That was a real pity because Khan would be a great addition to his engineering team; the Vengeance had been a real masterpiece, objectively speaking. The science teams were all under the supervision of Commander Spock, so that was a no-no too. Command and navigation were out of the question.

That left medical. It was an intellectually demanding discipline and Medbay was always in demand of scientifically-savvy minds to assist in research. It was perfect.

The only problem was Bones.

Bones always wanted to believe in the inherent goodness of all sentient beings, but he was hot-headed and blunt and didn’t deal well with having his friends messed with (read: choked). Damn Spock and his traitorous ass... if he hadn’t opened his big mouth Bones would be none-the-wiser right now.

Anyway, circumstances being what they were, Medical was the least bad choice available. He would consult Khan’s assignment with his therapist first and then inform the CMO. Where there’s a will there’s a way, or so his mother used to say, back when they were on speaking terms.

A quick check on the computer told him Dr Johnson was currently in Bones’ office. Okay, it would have to be two birds with one stone.

He took the turbolift to deck five, but halfway there the doors opened to reveal Dr Carol Marcus. She seemed strangely surprised to see him, hesitating by the doors then finally coming in and barking, “Deck six.”

Not even a ‘good day, sir’. Nothing. She was obviously pissed, and Jim knew exactly why. Her father might have turned out to be a psycho, but she was still his daughter and the augment who had murdered him was currently serving on the same starship as her under Jim’s authorization.

God, Jim was an asshole.

He stood there and bore the silent treatment like a man. He deserved it. There was nothing he could say that would put her at ease, but he wanted Dr Marcus on his ship, and he wanted to be on good terms with her, because there was nothing he admired more than someone who wouldn’t tolerate any harm against their family, no matter what.

That kind of felt like an epiphany, Jim thought as he got out of the lift, but it made him too uncomfortable to analyze so he just pushed it to the back of his mind and went to find Dr Johnson and his CMO.

\--

“You just missed her,” Bones informed him.

“What was she doing in here, anyway?”

“Not that it’s any of your business, but we were scheduling Khan’s physical.”

“Oh.” There was a pause while Jim decided whether he should tell his friend about his decision regarding Khan’s assignment. “So... I’ve been thinking about jobs I could give to Khan. Since, you know, he’s supposed to be working.”

“What did you have in mind?”

“I’m not sure yet.” It was technically true... Okay, no, it was a lie.

“Jim...”

Silence stretched. The tense atmosphere could only mean one thing: Bones had something to say, but for some reason he was holding back. And Bones didn’t often keep his opinions to himself. Time to hightail it out of there, before things got awkward for real.

“Well, I’m gonna go find Johnson. See ya!”

Bones didn’t try to stop him.

\--

He found Dr Johnson in the rec room, chatting animatedly with her new roommate. Jim took a moment to observe them from the other end of the room, cataloguing gestures and mannerisms. Johnson was truly a stunning woman, with long, luxuriant ash-blond hair, bright green eyes and legs so long Jim could run his hands up them for hours before reaching her pussy. Her perfectly-shaped lips were constantly stretched in a smile, and she leaned close to her alien interlocutor but never once touched her. She really was smoking hot.

When Lieutenant Ryxkreng walked away, Jim approached.

“Dr Johnson, good afternoon.”

“Captain Kirk.” Her smile waned slightly.

Jim, in turn, flashed his. “I was wondering if I could steal a little bit of your time today. I believe we have much to discuss.”

“We do.”

“Excellent! I’m kind of busy for the next few hours, so I was thinking we could meet for dinner?”

“That’d be great,” she agreed, lips widening in a smile again. “I was hoping we could discuss some things as soon as possible.”

“You should have sought me out.”

Johnson bowed her head demurely, her smile transforming ever so slightly into a smirk. “I didn’t wish to presume, Captain.”

Ohhh _fun_. “Presume away, Doctor. Abigail. Can I call you Abigail?”

“You can call me Abbey.”

Jim leaned in closer. “Abbey. I’ll meet you in my quarters at twenty one hundred hours. I have a small living room with a dining table where we can hold our meeting in private. Advantages of being a Captain.” He wondered if winking would be overdoing it.

Abbey tilted her head and frowned a bit, though she didn’t lose her smile. “As you wish, Captain.”

“Great. See you tonight.”


	6. The Business Meeting

Jim reached his quarters at eight fifteen and started taking off his clothes before even reaching the bedroom. He had to hurry if he wanted to have time to jack off in the shower before--

Damn, he had forgotten about his new roommate again. Khan was sitting on his cot, legs crossed and back against the wall, an old fashioned paper book on his lap. He looked up when Jim came in but didn’t say anything.

Thinking quickly, Jim said, “Hey, I thought you had your physical tonight?”

Khan narrowed his eyes. “Tomorrow morning.”

“Oh, didn’t Bones tell you? He rescheduled for tonight, twenty hundred hours.”

“Twenty hundred hours,” Khan repeated, dragging the words. It was obvious he was seeing through Jim’s bullshit like it was clear glass.

Jim couldn’t care less. “You’re late.”

Maybe he was being rather harsh, but Khan was intruding in his personal quarters so Jim had all the right in the world to kick him out whenever he wanted. And really, it was necessary, because he couldn’t really have a private conversation with Khan’s shrink about her patient if the man was going to be standing there listening in. No wonder Abbey had looked confused earlier when Jim had promised privacy.

Without another word, Khan put on his shoes and left. As soon as he was out the door, Jim rushed to the comm panel.

“Bones. Bones, you there?”

A loud sigh was heard through the speakers. “Yeah, Jim, I’m here.”

“You in sickbay?”

“I was just about to call it a day. You need anything?”

“Yeah. Khan’s coming your way. I told him you rescheduled his physical for tonight.”

“What? Why the hell would you do that?”

“I need him out of my hair till... I don’t know, eleven?”

“Eleven?!”

“Yeah, I’m meeting Abbey for dinner. Johnson. Khan’s therapist.”

“Dammit Jim, it hasn’t even been two days and you already--”

“No, Bones-- Bones, it’s a business meeting, okay?”

“Business meeting my ass.”

“Come on, Bones, you know I have to set up Khan’s rotations with her.”

Bones sighed again. “I knew this would happen. At least she’s the lesser of two evils.”

“What the hell does that mean?”

“Nothing. We’ll talk about it tomorrow. Now go shower or you won’t have time to jack off.”

Jim cut the comm, wondering when his friend had acquired mind-reading powers when it came to Jim’s personal masturbational habits. That man should get his esper rating re-tested.

Jacking off in a sonic shower was uncomfortable at best, in Jim’s opinion. The vibrating waves made his teeth throb and the friction on his dick tended to border on painful. But this time he was having a harder time concentrating than usual. He tried to focus on Abbey’s never-ending legs, her full lips stretched wide, but his thoughts kept drifting back to Khan. If he hadn’t kicked him out, the augment would be on the other side of the thin bulkhead right now. Jim refused to be embarrassed -- this was a normal, healthy activity that almost all humans enjoyed. Did Khan ever do it? Had... had he done it in this very shower stall? Did he like it fast and hard, like Jim? Did he also brace himself against the tiled wall? Did his breath get agitated?

Jim came with a frustrated growl, hating himself.

\--

The control panel announced Abbey’s arrival just as Jim was spiking his hair with some gel.

“Come in.”

“Captain Kirk,” Abbey greeted him as she entered the room, eyes searching around, presumably for her patient. She was dressed in a short black dress that left just enough to the imagination, hair arranged in long waves, red lipstick drawing Jim's gaze to her mouth. It was hard to remember this was a business meeting and not a date.

“Please, call me Jim. Have a seat. I’m almost done replicating our dinner. You like Denobulan sausages?”

“Sure.”

Jim caught a glimpse of her crossing legs under the table as he was bringing the hot plates over. Their glasses were already full with tempering wine.

“How are you finding life on board my ship, Abbey?”

“Quite comfortable, thank you.”

“Not much to do, huh?”

“On the contrary, I’m making great progress on my book. I believe I’ll be able to get it published before my time here is over.”

“Oh, you’re writing a book?”

“A work on the benefits of social integration in rehabilitation programs and a set of guidelines on how to employ this tool correctly.”

“You certainly know what you’re doing.”

“Never doubt that, Captain. I am the best in my field.”

“Jim.”

“Jim,” she conceded, lifting the fork to her mouth. Jim watched the action, then looked up to see he had been caught, and pretended to be embarrassed.

“So. Khan’s rotations. I was thinking he could start helping out in Medical, assisting with the current research projects. His augmented intelligence is sure to provide the research teams with a refreshing boost.”

“Augmented intelligence,” Abbey mumbled to herself. Then, more loudly, said, “I think that would be acceptable. I’ll discuss it with him and let you know.”

Jim felt a surge of annoyance at that. Khan was a convicted criminal serving parole on his ship; he didn’t get to decide anything.

“There is also the matter of missions,” Abbey continued. “I would like to start with them as soon as possible. They will be a most beneficial step in--”

“Missions?”

“Away missions. Admiral Bowles agreed Khan’s participation is--”

“That will not be possible, Doctor.” No way in hell. “Away missions are critical operations. I cannot compromise the security of my crew by allowing a non-cleared passenger to join the landing parties. You do realize all our lives depend on it.”

Abbey’s face hardened. “I see.”

“My hands are tied by regulations, Abbey,” Jim tried in a softer tone. She was someone he needed on his side -- for a variety of reasons. “I could get in trouble if I were to do what you’re asking. I know you talked about this with Admiral Bowles, but I haven’t received a formal communication.”

Abbey nodded, losing some of her previous tension. “I understand completely, Jim. It’s a pity, though. Participating in away missions would have been a much needed activity to complete Khan’s integration to a community. He’s been doing great so far and I really believe that having people depend on him and trust him, and being able to meet those expectations, is just what Khan needs to regain his confidence.”

Regain his confidence? “Khan is a pretty confident guy.”

“Jim,” Abbey said, smiling sadly. “Imagine you go to bed tonight and when you wake up tomorrow, three hundred years have passed. The world has changed so fundamentally that you don’t recognize it anymore. You’re no longer the captain of the Enterprise, you don’t have a crew to follow you. You are completely alone.” She took a sip of wine, as if deliberating on something. “Khan was the ruler of a whole empire. Then one day he woke up to find he was Marcus’... lackey,” she finished, obviously deciding on a different word at the last moment.

“That’s no excuse for murder.”

“No, Jim, it’s not. It is true Khan is a passionate man. That passion was twisted and shaped in his childhood to suit the needs of his creators. And Khan is loyal to the core. You saw it yourself, how he was willing to do anything it took to protect his crew, the last people from his time, all he had left.”

“You’re not going to convince me he was right to kill so many people.”

“Killing is never right, although I’m sure you do not agree with me... you’ve probably killed your share of people yourself. It’s taken me a year to help Khan harness his passion and learn the need to exercise control on it in these civilized times. We’re almost there.”

“’Almost’ means you’re still not there.” Wasn’t that a frightening thought?

“It’s a battle we all fight every day, Jim. But don’t worry, Khan doesn’t see you as a threat to his crew any longer.”

“I was never a threat to his crew.”

“In his time, Khan learned he could trust no one. And then upon waking here he realized that was still true, more than ever.” She took a deep breath. “I ask you, Jim, to give Khan a second chance. He needs friends, needs meaningful relationships to learn to rely on people again without fear.”

“He murdered seventy-four of my crew. You can’t ask me to be his friend.”

“I’m not. I’m just asking you to give him the opportunity to make one, even if it’s not yourself.”

“You are so convinced of his inherent goodness or whatever,” Jim said, half jealous and half disapproving, though he didn’t let those feelings color his voice (much).

“I am convinced of everyone’s inherent goodness.”

“Yeah, but you’re not as close to everyone as you are to him.” In truth, Jim didn’t know anything about how close she and Khan were. He just assumed they had to spend a lot of time together, and dropped the bait to see if she’d rise to it.

To his surprise, she didn’t seem angered by his words. “I won’t pretend I don’t know what you’re implying, Jim,” she said calmly. “But you need to be very careful with what you insinuate in front of others. I could lose my medical license.”

“Then just be honest with me. I can keep a secret.”

“I’ve been nothing but honest with you, Jim.”

He decided to press further. “Are you romantically involved with your patient, Doctor?”

Abbey smiled. “No, Jim. I won’t deny Khan is an extremely attractive man, but even if I were willing to risk my license like that, he doesn’t swing that way.”

 _He doesn’t swing that way_. Jim let that roll around in his head, but couldn’t wrap his mind around it. _He doesn’t swing that way_.

The meal finished shortly after and Abbey left, kissing him good night on the cheek. Jim’s mind was elsewhere.


	7. The Conversation With Capital C

Jim woke up feeling even more tired that he was when he went to bed. He had stayed up getting some work done (or rather, trying to, because he couldn’t focus) until Khan came back. Then he felt sort of stupid for waiting for him, so he changed quickly and went to bed without exchanging a word with his unintended roommate. He didn’t manage to get any sleep until a couple of hours before his alarm went off, though. Khan was unnaturally still all through the night, and Jim couldn’t shake the feeling that the other man was awake. It creeped him out.

He got out of the bed, showered and changed, and still Khan remained in his cot, eyes locked on the ceiling panels. He was so still Jim considered checking his pulse, but it was only a fleeting thought. He shook his head and headed for sickbay, comming Spock to let him know he’d be late to the bridge.

“Jim, come in,” Bones greeted him. “You eat yet?”

“Uh, no.”

“I’ll replicate some breakfast.”

“That’d be great. I could use some coffee.”

“I can see that. I’ll make it double shot. Khan kept you up all night again?”

Jim frowned. “You make it sound so dirty.”

“Did he or didn’t he?”

“No, I kept myself awake.”

“Thinking of Khan?”

Jim took the fifth and just rolled his eyes.

“Jim,” Bones said, suddenly all serious as he set a tray on his desk. Damn, a Conversation was coming, with capital C. Jim took the cup of coffee from the tray just to give himself something to stall with when his friend inevitably started asking uncomfortable questions. “You need to be careful.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“Don’t play dumb with me, kid. I’m trying to help you here.”

“I don’t need any help.”

“Don’t you?”

Jim took a sip of coffee, playing for time. It was true that the whole deal with Khan was driving him up the wall. He was thinking about the augment far too much. Not to mention inappropriately... although, in his defense, that had been just once.

“I know you are tempted,” Bones continued when it became clear Jim wouldn’t answer, “but don’t make a mistake.”

“You mean apart from agreeing to have Khan on board for a year?”

Bones narrowed his eyes. “Yeah.”

“I don’t know what you think you’re trying to protect me from, but I assure you, I’ve got everything under control.”

“It’s been two days and you’re already sleeping with his psychotherapist, Jim, for god’s sake! You told me you’d never sleep with your crew, remember?”

“Okay, let’s get some things straight here.” He was raising his voice but he was too pissed off to care. “First, I’m not sleeping with anyone, not that it’s _any of your business_. Second, I’m not her commanding officer, so if I wanted to sleep with her there’d be nothing wrong with that. Perhaps you’re too old to notice but she’s _hot_. So, unless it’s your professional opinion that my personal life is affecting my command, stay out of it. That’s an order, Doctor.”

Jim would have expected his friend to argue, to shout back, to re-state his opinion loudly as he always did. Instead he just sat there, observing Jim quietly while Jim tried to get his breathing back to normal. Then he said simply, “Don’t ‘doctor’ me, Jim. This is not about work. This is about friends looking out for each other. You know I care about you.”

Jim deflated. Talks about feelings always made him uncomfortable, but there was no denying his friend’s words were true. He chucked a piece of toast into his mouth.

“Sorry. I just don’t know what you’re trying to save me from. I know Khan and I had a little... accident... on our first night, but I won’t let it happen again.”

“Khan is just your type, Jim. Tall, dark and _dangerous_.”

“What?! What do you know about my type, anyway?”

“I know the only reason you’re not banging Spock right now is because he has a scary girlfriend.”

Jim spluttered. He should really ask for a re-testing of his friend’s esper rating.

“Jim, all I’m saying is, try to keep it in your pants just this once, okay? Khan is a really bad idea.”

“You’re insane. He killed our crewmates, _remember_? He’s a monster, and I’m not that desperate.” He finished his coffee in one gulp and forced a grin on his face. “His therapist, though... that’s a whole other matter.”


	8. The Feed

When alpha shift was over, Jim locked himself in his ready room and signaled the computer he didn’t wish to be interrupted. He’d been distracted all throughout his shift, trying to figure out the mystery that was Khan. That was the reason he was now at his terminal punching in the codes to access the security feeds; he needed this piece of the puzzle, needed to see it for himself.

Old feeds were heavily compressed and took a while to browse through and re-encode, but he finally found what he was looking for: medical bay, three hundred and sixty one days ago. The screen showed eighteen frames with simultaneous feeds, covering all corners of the sickbay, research labs and offices. On the third one, a lone cryotube lay on a biobed in an empty room. Jim did his best to ignore it, not wanting to think about his own dead body lying inside, and instead located and enlarged the one with the black-clad figure lying on a biobed.

Khan was lying still, with Bones standing over him and running scans in a frenzy. Then a rapid motion blurred the figures on the screen. Before Bones had time to react, Khan got up and grabbed him by the collar of his uniform, pushing him until the doctor’s back was bent over the next biobed.

The pure hatred in Khan’s eyes made Jim’s blood turn to ice in his veins. The last time he had seen that look, Khan had been crushing a man’s skull. Jim couldn’t help the fear that gripped his insides, despite knowing that the augment hadn’t killed his friend. Khan pressed Bones into the edge of the biobed with his whole body, hands climbing up to grip both sides of the doctor’s head.

“Khan,” Bones pleaded, gripping the other man’s arms. It was a tone Jim had never heard from his friend, small and broken and terrified. He felt horrible for watching, but he _needed_ to see this.

“You killed my family,” Khan said. To Jim’s surprise the augment also sounded broken, but not afraid. Never afraid.

Bones winced, which meant the pressure on his skull was getting painful. “No, Khan-- Listen to me-- Your family is safe, they’re _safe_.”

Khan jumped back as if burned, but immediately recovered, straightening up and narrowing his eyes. “No. No! You’re lying! The Vulcan set the torpedoes off, I saw them detonate, _I saw them detonate!_ ”

“Spock doesn’t kill innocent people,” Bones said, calm despite the circumstances. “We took the cryotubes out first.”

Khan took another step back. He looked horribly conflicted, like he wanted to believe the doctor but what he was saying couldn’t possibly be true. “If you are playing me...”

“Come see for yourself,” Bones replied, straightening up and walking through a door on the left. Khan took a while longer but finally followed.

Jim quickly pulled up the feed for the other room. Bones was standing to the side; in front of him lay dozens of cryotubes, their status lights blinking. When Khan came in, it was like the feed froze for a moment, but the timestamp on the upper corner kept adding seconds.

“They are all safe,” Bones said eventually. “I’m monitoring their vital signs, or what’s left of them anyway.”

That seemed to pull Khan out of his petrified shock. He... Jim couldn’t believe his eyes. Khan fell to his knees and cried. Actually _cried_. Not one tear like Jim had seen before, but a river of them. He was running his hands through his hair, rocking back and forth like a scared child. Bones turned away from the scene unfolding in front of him, but Jim couldn’t do the same. His eyes were glued to the screen, watering up from lack of blinking.

“Khan,” Bones said after what felt like an eternity, but according to the feed timestamp was only forty seconds. “Captain Kirk is dead. He suffered radiation poisoning when getting our warp core back online.”

Khan took a deep breath and wiped the tears off his cheeks. “I can save him.”

It was so simple an offering, but to Jim it literally meant the world. Khan was the reason Jim was watching this feed today, alive and breathing. It had been an abstract fact before but now it was undeniably real.

“I know,” Bones was saying. “That’s why we brought you back here.”

“That’s why your Vulcan friend didn’t kill me.”

“No. Spock doesn’t kill people unless it’s absolutely necessary.” If what Jim had been told about Spock’s actions that day was true, Bones was lying and he knew it.

“Take my blood, Doctor. Take my blood for your captain.”

\--

Concentration that afternoon was impossible. At least the charting mission had started out well, all tasks running smoothly. Jim retired to his quarters at eleven p.m., not bothering with dinner. What he had witnessed on the security feeds left him nauseous and lightheaded.

This time Jim was not surprised to find Khan in his bedroom. He was sitting lotus-style on his cot, barefoot but otherwise fully clad in black clothes, reading the same paper book as the day before.

“Good evening,” Jim said casually.

“Good evening.” The tense reply told Jim it was going to be another long night of elusive sleep for both of them.

“How was your day?” Jim was pretending to look for something in his dresser, his back to Khan, but he could practically feel the other man narrowing his eyes at the sudden cordiality. He cringed.

“Long.”

“Oh, you should be starting your Medbay shifts tomorrow at zero eight hundred. That’s alpha shift. Eight to four. I haven’t told Bones yet but I’m sure there won’t be any issues.” _Yeah, right_. “I mean, he’ll find you something to work on in no time. There’s tons of things to do and that’ll help you pass the time.”

Silence.

“Dr Johnson told you you’d be working in medical research for now, right?”

“Yes.”

“Great.”

Jim could only pretend to browse his drawers for so long, so he moved back into the living room. The air was so thick he could’ve cut it with a knife. It was hard enough reconciling his memory of a crazed Khan crushing Marcus’ skull with the broken man sobbing on the sickbay floor on the security feeds, but adding to that this other version of Khan, so on edge that the slightest push could make him topple over, was just maddening. Khan wasn’t supposed to be afraid. Ever.

But he was. He was scared, and it showed. Worse, Khan had to know that it showed. It had to be so humiliating for him, having to share such a small space with Jim every night, fearing he would lose control in his sleep again, laying bare his fears, his weaknesses. Humiliation was a punishment no one deserved, no matter their crimes.

“I’m making some Hayal’masu Vulcan tea,” Jim commented, procuring a small wooden box from a cabinet. “You want some? It’s a premium product now. Replicators can’t get it quite right; the taste is the same but the relaxing properties are lost. I’m telling you, one cup of this and you’ll sleep like a baby all through the night. Vulcans drink it to inhibit dreaming when meditation isn’t enough, or so Spock tells me.”

Jim grabbed a couple of mugs and went to the water dispenser, his back to Khan at all times. The situation was awkward enough without having to actually look at the other man. Was he overstepping some unspoken boundary? It was a very personal offer, after all, and he and Khan weren’t friends. They weren’t even on good terms, really.

Khan’s reply took a while to come, and when it did it was very quiet. “Thank you. I appreciate it.”

Jim let out the breath he was holding and filled the mugs with hot water from the dispenser. Then, in a fit of something that he didn’t dare name, set them on the dining table along with the tea box.

“Have a seat,” he said, sitting down on his usual chair and preparing his tea without waiting for Khan. The augment approached and sat down opposite him. They drank in silence, taking their time. Jim let the sweetness of the Hayal’masu wash over his tongue and warm his chest as he swallowed. The coarseness in his throat was almost gone now, though the terrifying memory of Khan’s hand around his neck in the pitch-black darkness was still fresh in his mind.

That night, Khan used the bathroom first while Jim changed in the bedroom. They didn’t speak to each other again except to say good night before putting the lights out.

Jim slept uninterrupted and in the morning he thought Khan looked well-rested, too.


	9. The Unwelcome News

At 7:45 the next day Jim was sitting in Bones’ office, raking his brain to find a way to peacefully inform his friend he would have a mass-murderer in one of his teams in fifteen minutes (plan A). He left the door open just in case he needed to make a hasty retreat (plan B).

“Jim, you’ve been talking about the environmental settings for twenty minutes. That means you have to tell me something I won’t like. Let me guess, it’s about Khan, isn’t it?”

Surprise, surprise, another accurate guess from his friend. Jim sighed. “Have you considered getting your esper rating re-assessed?”

“Khan is pretty much all you’ve talked about since we left Earth.”

“I talk about Abbey, too.”

“Not nearly as much, plus, she’s Khan’s therapist. It’s all about Khan, Jim.”

“It has nothing to do with Khan and you know it. Did I tell you I ran into her in the mess hall before coming here? I asked her out on another date tonight.”

“ _Another_ date? Wasn’t the other night just a business meeting?”

“Once is a business meeting, twice is a date.”

Bones shook his head. “Was there something you wanted to talk about, Jim, or are you here just to waste my time, as usual?”

Uh-oh. Cornered. The only way out was through, he supposed. “Yeah, actually. You know Khan’s starting his rotations today, right?”

Bones nodded, already narrowing his eyes in suspicion.

“Well, after much deliberation and consultations with his therapist and blah blah blah... we all decided it was in everyone’s best interest if Khan’s first rotation was... well... medical research.”

“ _What?!_ ” Bones smacked his palms flat on the table and leaned forward. “Jim, are you insane? You can’t possibly be saying you’re assigning Khan to one of my teams, here in _my_ sickbay. No.”

“Bones--”

“ _No_.”

“It’s only for a month--”

“No, Jim.”

“ _Doctor_ McCoy. Your objection has been noted, but this is a direct order from your captain.” They engaged in a stare-down contest for a moment. Jim relinquished first, deflating with a sigh. “Listen, no one likes having Khan around, but we all have our orders.”

His friend’s eyes flicked to a spot behind Jim and he sighed too, pinching the bridge of his nose. Jim turned around to see Khan standing at the door, and by the look of him he had heard what Jim had just said. Well, whatever. Jim didn’t owe him anything, didn’t have to sugar-coat the truth for him. He was unwanted on board Jim’s ship and he’d better not forget it.

“Khan,” Bones said through gritted teeth, shooting proverbial daggers out of his eyes.

It was Jim’s cue to leave, before hell broke loose.

\--

Spock greeted him on the bridge with exciting news: a new class-M planet had been spotted. Their scans detected no signs of life on the surface or immediately below it, although there appeared to be structures with characteristics indicative of artificial construction. A closer inspection was necessary to assess whether the planet was truly inhabited and therefore suitable for colonization. The only problem was the ion-heavy upper layers of the planet’s atmosphere; beaming down was out of the question.

Jim spent four hours in his ready room organizing the away mission with Spock, filling out paperwork, requesting shuttle checkups and putting together a landing party of ten divided in two groups. They were almost done when Uhura commed him to let him know he had an incoming transmission from Admiral Bowles.

“Thank you, Lieutenant. I’ll take it in here.”

Spock stood up and left without being asked to.

“Admiral,” Jim said when Bowles’ face appeared on his terminal. “To what do I owe the pleasure?”

“Captain Kirk. How is your mission going?”

“Well, sir, it’s only been three days--” _and you’re already checking up on me_ “--but so far so good. I was in fact just writing a report to send to headquarters. We’ve located a class-M planet and are going to conduct some scans tomorrow to ascertain its potential for colonization.”

“That is excellent news, Captain. And how is Khan adapting to his duties?”

“Today he started a month-long rotation in Medbay. He’ll be assisting with medical research.”

“What about away missions?”

Jim froze. “Away missions, sir?”

“As part of Khan’s rehabilitation program he is to participate in away missions, Kirk.”

He balled his hands into fists under the desk. This was Abbey’s doing, it had to be. “I... was not aware of that, Admiral.”

“Well, you are now. I’ll send you a formal communiqué. I want Khan to participate in at least half of all non-critical away missions. I think this new planet you’ve discovered is a great opportunity to start. What do you say, Kirk?”

Jim took a deep breath, attempting to get his mounting rage under control. “As you order, sir.”

“Good, good. I’m glad to hear things are going so well on board you ship, Captain. Do not hesitate to call me if you need anything.”

“I won’t. Thank you, sir.” _And fuck you._

“Thank _you_ , Kirk.”

The screen went blank.


	10. The Sore Spot

“What the hell did you think you were doing?!”

Abbey turned away from Spock, with whom she was chatting about literature like old friends (oh, will wonders never end) and looked at Jim with wide innocent eyes.

“Captain?”

“Don’t pretend you don’t know what I’m talking about. You went to Admiral Bowles behind my back.”

She tilted her head. “I spoke to him, yes. You told me yourself that the only thing preventing you from sending Khan on away missions was the lack of formal orders.”

“ _I_ am the captain of this vessel, Doctor. _I_ decide who goes where, and _I_ decide when it is necessary to consult with my commanding officers. You’ll do well to remember that or you’ll find yourself back on Earth sooner than you think.”

“Captain?” Spock interjected.

“We have orders to put Khan in half of all non-critical away missions, Spock,” Jim explained. He didn’t take his eyes off Abbey, so he couldn’t see Spock’s reaction (or, as usual, lack thereof). “Also, as per the terms of his parole,” he continued, quoting the communiqué, “he is to be accompanied by his psychotherapist at all times when away from the Enterprise. It behooves her to determine whether he is in fact fit to join the landing party at each opportunity, and only in case of physical impediment can the ship’s Chief Medical Officer intervene.” He finally looked at Spock, who was just standing there wearing a poker face like Jim was talking about the weather or something.

“I see,” was all he said.

Jim had had it. “Well, reorganize tomorrow’s landing party. And pull yourself out; I need one of us to remain on board in case... just in case.”

“Yes, sir.”

He turned back to Abbey. “Dr Johnson, I’m afraid I’m going to have to cancel our meeting for this evening. We have to reorganize the entire away mission for tomorrow.” Yeah, he had just told Spock to do it for him and she had heard. So what? She deserved it. Backstabbing _bitch_.

He turned around and left, not waiting for a reply.

\--

Three cups of coffee later, he was starting to regret his attitude. He liked Abbey, and he needed to be on her good side just in case, especially since she was going to be on his team for tomorrow’s mission.

Spock had re-organized the landing party into three teams. According to the mission plans his first officer had sent him half an hour ago, Jim would be on the Alpha team along with Lieutenant McMullin from Sciences (that guy had decent navigation skills, too), Abbey and Khan. He had cursed Spock at first, but eventually admitted to himself that it was the most --wait for it-- _logical_ choice. Yeah, Jim had to keep an eye on Khan personally.

The pre-mission briefing that evening didn’t include Abbey or Khan. Spock and Jim agreed that those two shouldn’t be made aware of all the information, so they would be briefed separately. Spock would talk to Khan and Jim to Abbey. ‘Conveniently’.

Bones pulled him aside after the briefing.

“Jim, I need to talk to you for a moment.”

“I know you hate shuttles, Bones, but I need you down there.”

“That’s not what I wanted to talk to you about, though you owe me a good bottle for that.”

“If you’re going to tell me I shouldn’t let Khan come--”

“You shouldn’t, but you have your orders, I know. But Jim, do you _have_ to have him on your team? What if something goes wrong? And make no mistake, it’s an away mission, something _will_ go wrong.”

“Bones--”

“What then, Jim? Who’s gonna have your back? Khan?”

Jim grimaced. He knew that. It was eating at the back of his mind but his hands were tied. He could not in good conscience send Khan alone with junior officers, he _had_ to go with him. And his first officer _had_ to remain on the ship in the not-so-unlikely case Khan killed Jim for good down on that planet. Spock agreed with him on that; that had to mean something, right?

“This is a terrible idea, Jim. You can’t have Khan on your team. You can’t even give orders to the guy!”

“As a civilian consultant on board a starship, he answers to the captain of said starship. Regulations back me up on that.”

“I’m saying _you_ can’t give orders to _him_. I’ve seen you try to do it, it makes you uncomfortable, it shows, and Khan doesn’t respect your authority at all.”

 _Ouch_. “You’re out of line.”

“Jim--”

“I’m sorry, Bones, but this isn’t your call.”

\--

The meeting with Abbey was strictly professional, but friendly. Jim apologized for his attitude earlier that day and in turn Abbey apologized for speaking to Admiral Bowles behind Jim’s back. Basic mission details and safety instructions were provided. Pleasantries were exchanged. This time Abbey didn’t kiss him on the cheek when she left, but all in all Jim considered it a successful meeting. They were back in each other’s good graces and that was essential not only for the upcoming away mission but for the entire year ahead of them in which they would have to share the close space of a starship.

When Jim got back to his quarters he found Khan on his cot yet again, still reading the same paper book.

“Hey, don’t you wanna scan that and read it on a pad?” Jim asked casually in lieu of a greeting.

“Pads don’t smell the same.”

Uh, whatever. He poured two cups of hot water, retrieved the Hayal’masu from the cabinet and sat down at the table.

“Tea’s ready.”

After a moment, Khan joined him. They drank in silence once again, and this time it was a tad less awkward. Maybe, just maybe, they were finding their equilibrium point at last. It was a good thing, considering they’d be working together in highly unpredictable situations for several months; in Jim’s experience, something _always_ went wrong in away missions.

Yeah, they definitely needed to build a closer relationship, for precautionary reasons. Jim spared no expenses when it came to the safety of his crew, and he wasn’t about to risk any lives, or even the outcome of any away mission, just because he didn’t like the people he had to work with. No, he was way past that point.

So, a little small talk was in order. But what could you possibly talk about with a three hundred year old psycho superman? The one constant for all men across time and space was women, but according to Abbey, Khan was apparently one of the exceptions to that tried-and-true rule. And Jim was _not_ about to discuss guys with Khan. No. Fucking. Way.

There was a loophole, though. Khan didn’t know what Abbey had told him. Jim could ask about it, and Khan would have to tell him something, right? Would he pretend to be straight? Would he be all ambiguous about it? Or outright say the truth? In Khan’s time, people weren’t as open-minded as in the twenty-third century. Would Khan be... afraid of Jim’s reaction?

And that was it. Jim could no longer keep the question to himself than he could stop stars from fusing hydrogen into helium.

“So. You and Abbey...?”

“No.”

Wow, that was _final_. The guy didn’t even pretend not to know what Jim was talking about.

“Why not?”

“Why yes?”

Khan was all but biting Jim’s head off. He most definitely didn’t want to talk about it, so Jim instinctively kept pressing.

“She’s hot.”

“Indeed.”

“So...?”

“She could lose her license.”

“I don’t think you’d care about that.”

Khan's lips lifted in a tiny smile and he bowed his head, tacitly conceding Jim’s point. “I’m simply not attracted to her.”

Khan was actually being truthful. And actually answering Jim’s questions, because he didn’t _have_ to do it, he could just get up and go to bed. How far could Jim push him?

“Have you even been attracted to anyone since they woke you up?” The look Khan gave him would have made a saner man shut his mouth, but Jim wasn’t exactly known for his sanity. “Or have you been celibate for three hundred years?”

The temperature in the room dropped. Khan had been annoyed before, but this was different. Jim could feel Khan’s anger, as clearly as he could feel that it wasn’t directed at him. He had stuck his finger in a sore spot, somehow. When Khan spoke again, his voice was like ice, each word as precise as a surgeon’s cut.

“Remember, Captain, that I wasn’t aware of the passage of time during cryogenic stasis.”

Jim didn’t know what to say to that. He had heard it from Abbey, but hearing it from Khan himself was a whole different matter. The man had gone to sleep one day and woken up the next one like any other night, only three hundred years had passed. Jim was aware, more than ever, of everything in his own world, the people he loved and the people he hated, his ship, his job... he couldn’t wrap his mind around the immeasurable fear of all that being gone when he woke up the next morning. How did Khan go to sleep every night? No wonder he had nightmares.

Khan finished his tea in one gulp and went to bed. Jim stayed at the table until his own tea got cold.

When he finally went to bed too, the other man still had his eyes open.


	11. The Most Horrible Way To Die

Lieutenant Rob McMullin stood on the hangar deck by the first shuttle, watching his captain discuss the final details of the mission with Commander Spock.

“You’re sure the air is safe down there?” Kirk was asking the Vulcan.

“Our scanners are 99.999964% reliable, Captain. However, as per protocol, there are six EV suits on board each shuttle.”

“Awesome.”

“I fail to understand your awe, Captain. One EV suit per seat is standard on all Starfleet shuttles.”

Rob looked away from the bizarre conversation and caught Khan rolling his eyes. Khan, a real flesh-and-blood augmented human. This whole thing was crazy. He was no doctor, but he had heard many things about the Enterprise’s last mission before her rechristening and it was clear as water to him that the man was clinically insane. A man like that shouldn’t be allowed on a starship. But some admirals spent so long behind a desk that they forgot what it was like out in space, so they gave ridiculous orders and had the captains deal with the resulting mess.

What worried Rob the most, though, was that his team for the mission consisted of Captain Kirk, Khan, and Khan’s therapist. No one doubted the captain’s skills to overcome any problem they could encounter, but what if he needed help? All he would have at his command would be a madman ready to betray him at the first opportunity, a bimbo shrink with no military training whatsoever, and... well, Rob himself. Rob had graduated from the Academy with decent grades and soon received a well-earned promotion, but he was only a scientist. He’d never be able to match Khan in a fight, should the need arise.

“Okay, people,” the captain was saying to the landing party in general, “we’re all set. Any last minute questions? No? Great. Alpha team, with me.”

Rob followed him into the shuttle and sat down next to him, at the copilot station. Khan and his girlfriend (or whatever) took the seats behind them. The port hole opened and they took off.

Even though they’d never piloted a shuttle together, Rob soon found that he and Kirk made a great flying team. Rob felt at ease with their shared rhythm, trusting the captain to anticipate his moves and anticipating the captain’s moves himself. He felt giddy to be flying like this with Captain Kirk, like equals, and he couldn’t wait to tell his brother about it. Rob’s navigation training was not exhaustive, but he knew that finding someone with your same flying style wasn’t common; usually the ‘weaker’ pilot had to adopt the style of their partner. They maintained a neat formation with the other two shuttles and achieved a smooth break into the planet’s atmosphere, holding the shuttle steady enough that it almost felt like being on a Constitution-class starship, hardly any tilting.

The flight was so easy that it took them a moment to realize something was wrong.

Rob placed a hand on the communications panel and shot a questioning look at the captain, who nodded at him to go ahead. He hailed the Enterprise and the other two teams but only received one answering signal.

“Gamma team, this is Alpha team, do you read us?”

“Alpha team, this is Gamma team. We hear you but we don’t see you on our scanners.”

“Our instruments are acting up, too. Do you have contact with Beta team or the Enterprise?”

“Negative, they’re not answering our hails. Requesting permission to--” A loud crackling noise interrupted the transmission.

“Damn! I mean-- we lost contact, sir. I will attempt to reconnect.” He tried to hail the other team again but the console was going crazy, showing inconsistent error data and not responding to any commands.

“I can’t pull her up,” the captain announced, quietly. Rob knew what that meant. They only had one option left: to land. At least the navigation instruments were still working--

With a loud crack from the back of the shuttle, the whole console shut down.

“Captain Kirk, the engines are failing,” Khan announced from behind.

“I know, Khan, I _know_.”

Rob realized he was frozen and shook his head, getting back to business. The instruments were useless, an unnerving rattling sound was coming from the engines and Dr Johnson’s whispered litany of ‘ohgodohgodohgod’ was utterly distracting, but at least the steering systems were more or less functional.

“Lieutenant, we need to attempt landing.”

“Aye, sir.”

Positioning the copilot’s helm at the necessary angles to steer in these conditions required actual physical strength. The blue-tinged clouds around them were clearing and Rob could see the ground getting closer and closer at a terrifying speed. They’d never be able to land this shuttle, they’d crash and blow up and burn and burning was number one in Rob’s list of most horrible ways to die and--

“Pull up pull up _PULL UP!_ ”

Rob responded automatically to his captain’s orders just as they were about to hit the ground.


	12. The Fall

It took Rob a moment to realize he wasn’t in his bed. It was the bone-piercing cold that first alerted him to that fact; the throbbing pain on his shoulder and butt were second. He didn’t want to open his eyes, knowing by the bright red color inside his eyelids that there was a lot of light around him, but a long-internalized sense of duty forced him to. At first, everything around him looked white. As his pupils adapted to the brightness, he started making out other things, his brain struggling to make sense of the images through the sleep haze. The whiteness sharpened into chalk-colored terrain. Dark spots became people and debris.

Captain Kirk was lying on his back three feet to Rob’s right, eyes closed, left hand bandaged and propped up on a cushion that looked like part of a seat torn from the shuttle. His chest was rising and falling evenly. Khan, clothes torn and covered in white dust but otherwise seemingly unharmed, was kneeling beside the blond woman, tending to a small wound on the side of her head. Her eyes were closed and she was sprawled against a piece of turbine. One of her legs was already bandaged and resting on a pool of blood. Rob himself was propped against what remained of the shuttle hull. His head was killing him and he was covered in tiny cuts and abrasions. He tried to roll his shoulder but the pain wouldn’t let him.

“Lieutenant,” Khan said, not looking up from his task, “thank you for joining me.”

“Is the captain okay?”

Khan’s face hardened. “We will know for certain when he wakes up.”

“And, uh... Johnson?”

Khan seemed to deflate a bit at that, and just looked... well, sad. “She’s lost a lot of blood.”

Rob tried to roll his shoulder again. “I think my arm is broken.”

“No.”

What? Had Khan checked his wounds while he was unconscious?

“I checked,” Khan confirmed as if he could read minds.

Rob felt kind of dirty, knowing that Khan had touched him while he was out of it, but he didn’t dare say anything. He pulled himself up with care and noticed he wasn’t seriously hurt, thank god. Out of the corner of his eyes he caught the captain stirring.

“Captain Kirk, sir.” He hurried to the man's side and helped him sit up.

“Lieutenant...” Kirk looked around, taking in the rest of them, his eyes lingering on Khan’s therapist. “Is Abbey okay?”

“She’ll live,” Khan said. “If we can keep alien pathogens out of her wounds.”

Kirk didn’t seem to like that reply, but didn’t comment on it. “The shuttle looks pretty bad,” he said instead.

“Fuel tank is punctured and empty,” Khan replied.

“Well, fuck.”

“I’ve gathered our supplies by that rock over there. Drink.”

Kirk looked uncomfortable at Khan’s ‘suggestion’, even though the man was right, they needed to stay hydrated. Rob managed to get up with a bit of struggle and fetched a couple of water canteens, handing one to the captain and taking a couple of swigs himself from the other one.

“Pass me one,” Khan demanded.

The man’s manners were atrocious but Rob was too exhausted to care, so he handed over his own canteen. At that point, the woman started waking up. Rob watched as Khan helped her come back to herself with soothing touches and whispered words that Rob couldn’t quite make out, holding the canteen as she gulped down the liquid. When she started crying silently, Khan wiped the tears from her cheeks. The gentleness Rob was seeing was hard to assimilate, after everything he had heard about this man and what he had seen himself. It was pretty obvious now that he and the woman were a couple. He stole a look at Kirk and caught him staring at Khan, too, but as soon as he realized he was being watched he looked away and started checking his pockets.

“Damn, I lost my communicator. Lieutenant, do you have yours?”

Rob reached into his pocket and felt it there, a tiny ray of hope that maybe they’d get back to the Enterprise and he’d get to see his niece again. He tossed it to Kirk.

“I’ll, uh, I’ll go check the shuttle, sir.”

He knew Khan had already checked but he needed to do _something_. He went inside what remained of the hull and tried out all the controls on the console. He didn’t even manage to turn the displays on. He could hear the captain outside trying to contact the Enterprise and the rest of the landing party to no avail. He tried twice as hard to get the shuttle online then, which only meant he punched buttons harder because the thing was totally dead. There was really nothing that could be done. After about ten minutes his fingers became numb with the cold and he gave up. When he came back out, Abbey was already on her feet aided by makeshift crutches fashioned out of debris, Khan was taking out his coat and helping her into it, and the captain was packing the supplies and the medkit in standard-issue backpacks.

“Temperature is dropping fast,” Khan said. “We need to find shelter.”

“We’ll go in the direction the sun is setting,” Kirk replied, a little briskly. “That’ll buy us a few more minutes of daylight.”

“No,” Khan said. He pointed in the opposite direction. “We’ll go that way.”

Kirk looked half angry and half scared, and didn’t have an immediate reply. Rob felt very uncomfortable with this turn of events. Kirk was supposed to be in charge here, not Khan, but the augment was taking command with an ease born of years of leading people that Rob had only seen before in admirals and seasoned captains. Who the hell _was_ that guy, anyway?

“There is a building a couple of hours ahead,” Khan continued. “I saw it as we were going down.”

“Uninhabited?” Kirk asked.

“That is what your ship’s scanners said.”

Oh, man, that guy was _impossible_.

“Fine,” Kirk said. “Let’s see if we can reach this building before sundown. Abbey, how fast can you walk on those?”

“It’s not as difficult as it looks.” She took a couple of steps forward to prove it. “I can make a pretty good time, I think.”

“We can help you, if you need.” Kirk handed Rob and Khan a backpack each and kept the last one himself. Rob threw it over his good shoulder. “Okay, let’s get going.”

They started walking with their backs to the sun, trying to keep up a good rhythm despite their injuries. Khan quickly went on ahead, keeping a distance of about a hundred yards from the rest of them. Abbey was making a good pace, like she said. The captain seemed mostly unharmed, except for his hand which he kept touching thoughtfully.

“Did you put these bandages on me, Lieutenant?” he asked all of a sudden.

“No, sir.”

Kirk went silent again, frowning. Then he picked up his pace and left them behind, catching up with Khan. Rob watched them for a while. They started talking, but he couldn’t hear what they were saying.

“Are you worried?” Johnson asked him. It was clear she wasn’t talking about them being stranded on a freezing alien planet.

“Should I be?”

“I don’t think my answer will make any difference to you.”

“I just don’t understand. Do they get along?”

“They are getting there, I think. Khan doesn’t tell me much about Jim, but I’ve seen a change in him these past few days and it’s definitely for the better.”

 _Jim_. So she was on first name basis with the captain. “I see,” Rob said simply. Maybe he had it all wrong, maybe the captain was on good terms with Khan and this woman, maybe he trusted them. And if the captain trusted them, that was good enough for Rob, too.

\--

An hour later, when the cold had pierced through to their bones and Rob couldn’t feel his hands or feet anymore, the captain signaled to them that he could see the building at last. Rob was especially glad for Johnson, because her fingers looked dangerously purple where they curled around the crutches; he feared they might snap off if anyone tried to pry them loose.

Up close, the building looked like a small one-story house. It had a five-foot-tall door with no handle and one irregularly shaped window on each of the other three walls, though they were coated on the inside with the same chalk-colored dust that covered everything (including their own hair, skin and clothes) so it was impossible to see through them. There was no sound coming from inside, nor did they detect any movement.

“Hello?” Kirk tried, standing next to the door. “Is there anyone in here?”

No reply. He pulled out his phaser and signaled Rob to do the same. They stood on either side of the door, plastering themselves against the wall.

“Ready?”

Rob nodded, and a second later Kirk was whirling on his feet and firing a phaser shot against the door.

Nothing happened. The shot didn’t even bounce, it was simply absorbed by the house.

“Huh. Any ideas, people?”

Rob barely had time to stand back as Khan pushed the captain aside and kicked the door squarely in the middle. The cement-like material budged and crumbled in a cloud of dust like it was plaster.

“Okay...” Kirk said, clearly as shocked as Rob was. Rob resolved to ask the captain later exactly how much he trusted this man.

Khan ducked and went inside the small opening without hesitation, even though he was supposedly unarmed.

“Wait here,” Kirk said, and followed him in. After a moment he called from inside, “Clear!”

Rob put his phaser away and helped Abbey through the entrance. The house turned out to be just one room, no dividing walls, and furnished with the basics. A moldy mattress in a corner with no blankets or pillows, a huge stone basin full of soot with a copper pan balanced on the edge, a rudimentary toilet (no privacy partitions) next to what looked like a square bathtub with a shower outlet above it, and in the center of the room a big computer station of some kind.

“It’s not much warmer in here,” Kirk said, “but who knows when the sun goes down. I say we stay. Lieutenant, help me check this computer?”

The machine looked ancient, but not so alien. Rob identified standard circuits, a recognizable control layout, and the empty space to plug in some sort of power source. They didn’t have anything on them that could even remotely provide enough energy to power up the terminal, though.

A loud clanking noise startled both him and the captain out of their work and they looked up to see Khan standing next to the shower. After a few moments, a clear liquid started coming out of it.

“No hot water,” Khan announced, turning it off again.

“We don’t even know if it’s water, Khan. Just in case, let’s stick to our own canteens. I estimate we’ve got supplies to last us three days.”

There was a pause that felt inexplicably pregnant. Rob was sure he was missing some contextual clue.

“More than enough,” Khan said in a strange tone that made absolutely no sense.

“Yeah.” Kirk took a deep breath and let it out slowly. “Yeah. I’ll check the outside of the house to see if there’s anything we can burn to make a fire. Stay here.”

\--

Fifteen minutes later, they were still waiting for Captain Kirk. Khan and Johnson were across the room from Rob, sitting on the floor with their backs against the wall. Rob had suggested Johnson sat on the mattress because of her injured leg, but Khan told her not to, saying that the alien mold could make her sick.

The last rays of sunlight started fading out so Rob got up and fetched a lantern from one of the backpacks and set it up on top of the broken computer station.

Khan stood up too. “He should be back by now. I will go get him.”

“No,” Rob said. His guts tensed immediately like he was making the worst mistake of his life by contradicting the augment, but he stood up straighter and continued, “I’ll go.”

He waited for Khan’s refutation and, when none came, he headed for the door and stepped outside. Now he understood why the captain hesitated when giving Khan orders. There was just something about the man that made you want to bow your head and do anything he told you to.

He found Kirk right behind the house, staring at a messy pile of moldy blankets and holding one in his hand. Even in the dark, he looked... lost.

“Captain?”

Kirk turned to look at him.

“Sir, I think those are too dirty to use. But it’s warmer inside now, anyway.”

Kirk just stared at him. Something was wrong. He didn’t look well.

“Sir?” No reply. Rob reached out with his hand, palm up. “Sir, we should go inside. Come with me.”

Slowly, very slowly, Kirk let go of the blanket and started walking toward him. From up close, in the faint ray of light coming through the grimy window, Rob could see how shitty he looked. He was pale and sweating, and the blank look on his face was worrying.

“Let’s go inside,” Rob said, and accompanied the other man to the front of the house. Kirk moved slowly, hesitantly, like he was unsure of what he was doing. When they reached the entrance, Rob noticed the man’s pupils were blown wide and not responding to the light coming from inside.

Kirk went in, took five steps and just stood there, in the center of the room. Rob watched from the door. What the hell was going on?

“I don’t feel so well,” Kirk mumbled. A second later, his knees gave way and he crumbled to the floor.


	13. The Antipyretic

Khan was beside Kirk before the captain even finished falling, easing him to the ground and crouching beside him. Rob struggled against his rising panic and ran to the backpacks, rummaging inside for the medkit. He pulled out the medical tricorder and went to Kirk’s side. The captain’s eyes were glazed, but open.

Khan touched the back of his hand to the captain’s forehead. “He’s running a fever,” he announced.

A second later the tricorder beeped, informing Kirk’s temperature was 39 degrees Celsius and rising at the rate of one degree per minute.

“Kirk,” Khan said, holding the captain’s shoulders and trying to catch his gaze. “Kirk, do you know where you are?”

“I... What?”

“Do you know who I am?”

“Uh...”

Khan grimaced. “Do you know who _you_ are?”

Kirk just stared at him.

This was really bad. Rob turned the medkit over and fumbled through the contents.

“Is he okay?” Johnson asked from the corner.

“No,” Khan said without preamble. “We need to get his temperature down.”

“Here!” Rob handed Khan a hypospray that contained an antipyretic, and the augment promptly applied it to Kirk’s neck.

Kirk’s eyes widened. He brought his injured hand to his neck and started scrambling away from them, no trace of his former weakness, although he wasn’t standing up yet.

“Is it working?” Rob asked.

“I don’t think so. Kirk?”

“Why did you do that?” Kirk asked in a near whisper.

Khan stood up and started walking toward the captain. Kirk kept crawling back until his back hit the wall, then pulled himself to his feet. Khan reached out a hand and touched his forehead again.

“Stay away from me!”

“Lieutenant, what does the tricorder say?”

Rob quickly stood up and approached them, tricorder in hand. In four seconds it had another reading, this one even more worrying that the first. “Forty one degrees and rising. The antipyretic hasn’t kicked in yet.”

“We need to get his temperature down before it causes brain damage.”

“What do we do?”

The next few instants went by almost in slow motion. Rob watched as Khan placed his open hand on Kirk’s chest. Kirk grabbed it to push it away and Khan took the opportunity to catch the man’s wrists and pin them above his head with his free hand. Then his other hand slid down to the hem of the captain’s shirt.

The atmosphere suddenly changed. Rob noticed he was standing several feet away, but could not remember stepping back. The look of terror on the captain’s face was horrifying. He stood very still as Khan pulled up his shirt, breath coming in short gasps through his parted lips. Khan took off first his golden uniform shirt and then his undershirt, both times expertly maneuvering them around his pinned wrists, releasing his grasp for an instant so short Kirk didn’t have time to pull away.

Then his hand went to Kirk’s waistband, and the captain went wild. He started pushing and kicking and screaming, desperate attempts to get free that Khan thwarted again and again, taking each hit of the captain’s knees like he couldn’t feel them at all, managing to undo the buttons of Kirk’s pants in the process.

“No! Get your hands off of me!”

“What are you doing?” Rob asked through the screaming. He was petrified with fear, but managed to move his hand toward his holstered phaser, gripping it tight.

“If I get his clothes wet, he’ll freeze to death.”

And Rob understood then, he understood what Khan was trying to do. Kirk obviously didn’t, though. Couldn’t. The captain was delirious with fever and with something else, something alien. He kept thrashing and screaming and it was a painful sight to see but Rob couldn’t tear his eyes away.

“Don’t touch me!”

“Stand still or I will hurt you,” Khan ground out through clenched teeth.

As if those were magic words, Kirk stopped kicking. He was still sobbing and squirming but it was obvious he was trying to stand still.

“Please...”

“Help me with his boots,” Khan told Rob, ignoring Kirk’s plea.

In a dream-like haze, Rob approached the captain and went down on his knees, undoing the laces on the man’s boots. He felt detached, as if he were standing aside watching himself, watching this bizarre scene unfold. A drop of liquid fell on his hand and he looked up. Kirk was crying.

“We’re running out of time, Lieutenant.”

Khan’s voice pulled him back to the present. He finished taking off the captain’s boots and Khan started taking off his own with his free hand. Rob felt a wave of relief wash over him, knowing that he wouldn’t have to be the one to hold the captain still under the shower spray. He braced himself for what he was about to do and with a quick tug pulled Kirk’s pants down. He just wanted to get out of there and not have to listen to the great Captain Kirk crying and pleading, not feel like a... a... _pervert_. Oh, for Christ’s sake, he needed to pull himself together! Kirk was seconds away from suffering permanent brain damage and Rob was cringing away from doing what was necessary like he was a fucking coward. But if only he could block Kirk’s voice out...

“Please... stop...”

“Stand. _Still_.” Khan was merciless as he took off his own clothes, never once letting go of Kirk’s wrists.

“Let me go, _please_...”

There was someone else crying in the room, Rob realized. It was Johnson. She hadn’t moved from where she was sitting on the floor across the room, but she was holding both her hands to her mouth, shaking, face streaked with tears. She was silent except for her gasping breaths.

Khan turned Kirk around and held his wrists behind his back. The captain’s body was covered in sweat; his white underwear stood out against the fevered flush of his skin.

“NO! No, please!”

Khan maneuvered Kirk over to the bathtub and into it, then turned on the shower. Kirk started struggling again as the water began pouring down, but Khan held him tight, forcing them both down to their knees under the spray.

It felt like ages, but after a while Kirk’s fighting became weaker and weaker until it stopped altogether. Khan let go, sitting back and closing his eyes, taking deep breaths. Kirk was still except for his shaking shoulders; he was still crying.


	14. The Twelve-Point-Three-Minute Window

Khan turned off the shower and stepped outside, picking up his own shirt and handing it to Kirk.

“Dry yourself.”

Obedient like an automaton, Kirk stood up and rubbed the cloth over his skin. He kept his head bowed. Khan also dried himself off, using a pair of socks of all things. Then he took off his soaked underwear and pulled on his pants, sweater and boots. Rob picked up Kirk’s uniform from the floor and handed it to him, then took a reading of his temperature with the tricorder while the captain got dressed. Thirty seven point three degrees.

Nobody spoke.

When Khan was fully dressed, he turned to Kirk, who was still putting on his boots. The expression on the augment’s face was unreadable.

“We need to change your bandages,” he said eventually. “They are wet.”

“I’ll do it,” Rob said. He wanted to keep Khan away from Kirk, for the captain’s sake. He picked up the medkit and approached Kirk, taking his hand and slowly peeling the soaked dressing off of it. Kirk looked miserable. Tears were still spilling from his eyes, though he wasn’t sobbing anymore. And he was so pliant it was uncomfortable to watch.

His hand had a deep cut along the back and around the little finger. The finger itself was badly damaged, but Rob was sure it was salvageable if they could get Kirk to the Enterprise and to a real doctor soon. He finished wrapping the clean bandages around it and wiped his hands on his shirt.

Kirk went to the other end of the room and sat down against the wall. Khan, in turn, moved to the corner farthest from Kirk. Rob didn’t want to just stand there awkwardly so he went to sit down next to Johnson. She looked as exhausted as Rob felt.

There was an eerie quietness around them. Not one sound came in from outside; not the humming of a car engine, not the steps of hurried people, not the chirping of a cricket. Inside the house it was pretty much the same except for the low buzz of the lantern in the center of the room.

A loud beep cut through the silence and Rob almost jumped out of his skin. His communicator was flashing its green light from where it lay discarded on the floor, indicating an incoming transmission. Khan, who was closest, reached out to pick it up and tossed it over to Kirk, who caught it with one hand.

“Kirk here.”

“Captain?” It was Commander Spock’s voice.

Kirk immediately stood up and got all business, no trace left of the broken man that had been moping in a corner seconds before.

“ _Spock_. Spock, did you contact the rest of the landing party? Is everyone all right?”

“We have located the Beta and Gamma teams. Mr Scott is beaming them on board as we speak. The ion storm has cleared temporarily and we have an estimated twelve-point-three-minute window remaining.” There was no inflection to his voice, but the tiny pause that followed had Rob bracing himself for the bad news. “Captain, there have been two casualties, Ensigns Hurst and Kavanaugh. Lieutenant Niir’s left arm will have to be amputated. Lieutenant Sulu has sustained extensive damage to his head, although his prognosis is favorable, according to Doctor McCoy.”

A disconcerting mix of guilt and relief twisted the captain’s features. Rob barely knew the people Commander Spock had mentioned, but the captain probably did.

“Amputated,” Johnson echoed beside him, pulling Khan’s coat tighter around her. Rob winced.

“Don’t worry,” he whispered. “You’ll be fine.”

“Captain,” Spock was saying, “what is the status of your team?”

“Four to beam up. Please have medical personnel standing by for Dr Johnson; she has suffered an injury to her leg.”

“Acknowledged.”

Kirk closed the communicator and moved to the center of the room. Rob helped Johnson up and joined him in standard beam-up formation. When Khan took his place in front of them, Rob noticed Kirk’s eyes were fixed on the back of the man’s head.

The familiar feeling of his atoms breaking apart engulfed Rob and the next thing he knew he was standing in the transporter room of the Enterprise, Captain Kirk’s limp body dropping to the floor beside him.


	15. The Deal

Jim was startled awake by the sudden spinning of the room. His eyes flew open and he grabbed the closest solid thing, which felt like some kind of handrail. He noticed he was lying on his back and tried to pull himself up, but a hand on his shoulder stopped him.

“Take is easy, Jim. The dizziness is normal. I'm pulling you out of sedation.”

Bones. He was in sickbay, then. He lay back and closed his eyes until the vertigo receded.

“Bones? What time is it?”

“Two p.m., Saturday.”

“Saturday?” Then he remembered the mission on the class-M planet. “Shit. How's Abbey?”

“Walking. The limp should go away in a couple of weeks.”

 _Thank god_. “Sulu?”

“At his station on the bridge. Excellent recovery.”

“And... Niir?”

Bones looked away. “Bionic arm. She won't be able to work in Security anymore.”

Well, fuck.

“Right now you need to focus on your own health, Jim. I brought you some food. First you're going to eat and then we're going to do some tests. Cognitive functions, motor control... the basics. Scans show no significant brain damage but you know me, I like to do things old-style.”

“Yeah, sure...” He was examining his scarred left hand when a thought struck him. “Hey, Bones? Why am I in the quarantine room?”

“Your screaming was disturbing the rest of my patients.”

Jim did a double-take. “What?”

“Nightmares. As far as I can tell, they are a residual effect of the alien fungus you inhaled.”

A clear picture of a pile of blankets flashed in Jim’s mind. “The mold...”

“Yeah, _the mold_. You just had to go and sniff it, didn't you? I'm telling you, kid, you have no self-preservation instinct. How you made it to twenty-seven is beyond me. You're lucky Khan and McMullin managed to get your temperature down as fast as they did, or you'd be beeping yes-or-no answers from a machine now.”

Jim closed his eyes at the flood of memories his friend's words called to mind. Khan's unyielding hands pinning his wrists, ripping off his clothes. Lieutenant McMullin yanking down his pants. The cold wall against his back. The fear. The humiliation.

He fought down a wave of nausea. “Bones, can we do this later? I-- I don't feel so well.”

“Jim...” Bones sat on the edge of the biobed and got that look on his face that meant a ‘Conversation’ was coming. “Jim, Spock and I talked to McMullin.”

“Oh, god...”

“You need to talk about it, too.”

“No. I feel stupid enough already.” No way was he going to discuss in detail how he had panicked to the point of mistaking a perfectly proper situation for something else entirely, how he had broken down in front of a subordinate and Abbey and _Khan_ , of all people.

“You were under the effects of an unknown infectious agent. Delusions are common under the circumstances.”

“Yeah, right.”

“Jim, what’s going on in your head? Talk to me.”

“I’m fine.”

“The hell you are. For god’s sake, kid, not a week ago Khan was choking you to within an inch of your life, now he got you naked against your will while you were delirious with fever and a goddamned alien fungus-- and don’t think I don’t know exactly what you thought he was doing to you.”

“He was helping me, Bones!”

“But that’s not what you _thought_.”

Fuck Bones. Why did he have to keep pressing the matter? “Yeah, well, that’s water under the bridge now.”

“Is it?”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

Bones sighed. “Jim, I want to help you. I understand how you feel right now--”

“You can’t possibly understand, Bones.”

“Yeah? Try me.”

“You don’t have to share your quarters with Khan after you cried rape when he was trying to help you!” Fuck. Fuck fuck _fuck_. He didn’t mean to say that out loud. “Look, I know I was... delusional, or whatever you want to call it. I know I didn’t even know where I was, or _who_ I was. But I remember everything and I’m just about ready to die from the shame right now, so can we _please_ stop talking about it?”

“Sure. As long as you agree to take counseling sessions.”

“What? No. Bones, no.”

“This is a traumatic event--”

“It wasn’t real!”

“It was to _you_.”

Jim sighed. “I don’t need counseling sessions. I’ve already-- I don’t have time for that.”

“Jim, I-- Dammit. I’m not supposed to tell you this, but you’ll figure it out eventually. I talked to Johnson and apparently Khan’s not dealing well with this either. She didn’t tell me much... I don’t think Khan told _her_ much. Anyway, even if you kick him out of your quarters, you still have to keep him on board for a whole year, so either you find a way to deal with this potential disaster or you let somebody else help you deal with it, okay?”

“I’ll deal with it.”

“I’ll be the judge of that. And Johnson.” He stood up and grabbed a tray from the side table. “Now eat. We have a lot of tests to go through today. Oh, and I’m keeping you here overnight.”

“Booones...”


	16. The Bit Of Popular Wisdom

Through the countless language exercises and hand-eye coordination tests, Jim had a lot of time to think about his predicament. It was becoming clearer and clearer to him that what he had to do was simply spend more time with Khan. It was a win-win situation, really. They’d do more stuff together, build rapport, and Jim would have first-hand insight into the man’s mind, which could actually come in handy given that they still had a whole year ahead of them to work together in literally close quarters. They say to keep your friends close and your enemies closer, and Jim was determined to apply that bit of popular wisdom with Khan.

That was easier said than done, though. Their mutual understanding (because it couldn’t be called a relationship of any kind) was frail at best before the away mission, and now... now Khan was probably disgusted with him for how he had reacted down on that planet. Jim didn’t blame him, though. He had acted disgracefully, losing control in the middle of a crisis. What kind of leader did that make him? Yeah, the shitty kind. And Khan... leadership came naturally to him. He was always in control, at least when it mattered. If the man weren’t serving probation right now, Jim was sure he’d end up losing his commission to him in no time at all.

Jim had always believed he was born to lead. When Pike had first given him the Enterprise, Jim was convinced he’d kick ass at it. And for a while he thought he did. But reality had slapped him on the face _hard_ , and it hurt. He wasn’t ready. Despite Starfleet’s second vote of confidence in him, he still wasn’t ready. He knew it. Pike told him once that the best leaders were made, not born. That it took time. But Jim didn’t have time. He had four hundred and thirty one people to look after _right now_ , and one of them was a superiorly engineered killing machine.

Maybe, just maybe, in the process of getting closer to Khan, he could learn a thing or two from him.

\--

His quarters looked the same as he had left them, at first. But as he got dressed and used the bathroom to get ready for alpha shift, he started noticing the little changes: there was a second sonic toothbrush by the sink, the empty half of his closet now contained clothing items that were definitely not his, there were old-fashioned paper books on his shelves, and he couldn’t find a goddamned protein bar or MRE ration _anywhere_.

Khan was nowhere to be found, either.

\--

Alpha shift went okay, considering. He managed to both avoid McMullin and convince Spock to leave out ‘unimportant details’ in the report regarding their last mission (“the fact that this apparently deserted planet has at some point been inhabited is what we really need to focus on, Spock, don’t you agree?”).

And he also arranged to meet Abbey for drinks in the rec room that evening. Maybe he’d even get lucky that night, too. _Not with Khan sleeping right next to you_ , a little voice reminded him in his head, but he ignored it. The room was his and he could kick Khan out for a couple of hours if he wanted.

By five in the afternoon Jim was ready to call it a day. He got into an empty turbolift and hit the deck five button, his mind already miles away, fantasizing with a hot water shower (impossible) and an early night in after Abbey (actually possible if he set his mind to it). He didn’t realize the turbolift had stopped until Khan got in and the doors closed behind him.

It was like someone had cut a hole in the ship hull, the way the air got suddenly thin and chilled. Then Khan hit the emergency stop button and Jim’s heart caught in his throat. “What are you doing?”

“Giving us a moment alone, Captain,” Khan replied, advancing on Jim until he had him cornered against the panels and their faces were inches apart. “Why? Are you... scared?”

Jim’s traitorous body almost made him nod and that pissed him off more than Khan’s attitude. He stood up straighter and let his growing anger color his voice. “What do you want, Khan?”

“I know you don’t like me, Captain. I’ve given you ample reason not to.”

“Damn right you have.”

“I am paying for my mistakes in the way you wanted, am I not? It was you who requested at my trial that I undergo rehabilitation treatment.”

“Was I right to do so?”

The augment narrowed his eyes and leaned in an inch closer. “I am many things, Captain, but a rapist is not one of them.”

Jim relented. “No, no, of course not. I never said that.”

“You don’t have to.”

“I know you were helping me.”

“Yet you pushed me away and begged me to stop.”

Jim shut his eyes tight and tried to get those memories out of his mind. “I’m sorry, okay? I’m sorry I reacted like that. I was not myself, the fungus--”

“You don’t have to justify yourself.”

Jim opened his eyes again to find Khan had stepped back. “I know. But I really am sorry. I want things to be okay between us. You’ll be on my ship for at least a year and I want-- I _need_ things to be okay.” He made a split-second decision and laid all his cards on the table. “We just need to hang out more, that’s all. I’ll do the effort if you do the effort. What do you say?”

Khan frowned as he considered this, and eventually nodded.

“Great. We could start by having dinner in our quarters tonight, together. Sound good?” _Yeah, forget Abbey, right, Jim?_

Khan nodded again.

“I’ll be there at eight,” Jim said, then released the emergency stop and pressed the button for the closest deck. He was out of the turbolift in three seconds, cursing to himself even as he pulled out his communicator and sent a text message to Abbey saying he wouldn’t be able to make it that night. What kind of moron stood a gorgeous woman up to have dinner with a guy he only shared mutual dislike with?


	17. The Deep Dark Secret

News of their next assignment almost took Jim’s mind off of Khan. He called Spock to a quick meeting to discuss the new mission and only checked the time a couple dozen times throughout it.

“Captain, do you have more pressing issues at this moment?”

“What?” He looked up from the clock on his communicator display. “No, no. You have my full attention, Spock.”

“It is evident that I do not. Should you need to attend to other matters, we can reschedule this meeting for another time. At our current speed, it will take us three point forty one standard days to reach Sahl Two.”

“I guess you’re right, there’s plenty of time. And I actually do need to, uh, attend to other matters.”

“Personal matters?”

“Yeah, Spock, _personal_ matters. You have a problem with that? My shift ended four hours ago.”

“Not at all, Captain. I merely wished to ascertain whether I would be further needed this evening.”

Jim sighed. “Right. Sorry.” Maybe he was being a little paranoid. There was nothing wrong with having dinner with a civilian consultant on board your ship in order to strengthen professional relationships, right? “I’m having dinner with Khan in ten minutes.”

Spock raised an eyebrow.

“What?” Jim asked, crossing his arms. “No, you know what, save it. I don’t want to hear it. God, you’re worse than Bones!”

He got up and left before Spock could say another word.

\--

Getting worked up on your way to what could be considered a ‘diplomatic affair’ was a bad idea. Jim knew this because Diplomatic Studies was a mandatory course at the Academy. So now he was working hard to get his mind off the fact that he was pissed at Spock, pissed at Bones, and most of all pissed at Khan, all before reaching his quarters.

It was true that Khan had been intruding in Jim’s personal and professional life ever since he set foot on the Enterprise more than a week ago. But Jim had to admit, even if only for the sake of cooling off his own anger, that the man had been endeavoring to be a good guest despite knowing he was an unwanted one. Putting aside the fact that he had taken advantage of Jim’s little vacation in sickbay to rearrange his personal stuff and get rid of his food (and _boy_ did that piss Jim off) and that he had undermined Jim’s authority in front of a crewmember down on that abandoned planet (okay, maybe Jim did deserve that), Khan had actually made considerable efforts to keep out of everyone’s way and be respectful. It was clear that he was having a hard time with it --he was, after all, a king-- but Jim had to give him points for trying. It was undeniable that the man had come a long way from the megalomaniac psychopath who commandeered a Starfleet ship and crashed it in the middle of San Francisco.

Jim stood outside his own quarters for a moment and contemplated that last fact. Was it possible for someone to change so fundamentally? Had Khan always been that psychopath, or were his actions a year ago the consequences of a temporary mental breakdown? Marcus had essentially kidnapped him for months and threatened to kill his family. Was Khan really a savage, or did Marcus make him that way to suit his needs?

Khan’s voice resonated from the door panel speakers, cutting off Jim’s train of thought. “Are you awaiting my permission to enter your own quarters, Captain?”

A smile escaped Jim’s lips. “Open.”

A mouth-watering smell welcomed him when the doors parted. The table was set for two with all kinds of delicious foods that Jim was sure were not programmed into the replicator matrix. Khan was standing beside it, looking freshly showered.

“I took the liberty of requesting some real food from the galleys,” the augment explained.

“You mean you bribed the cook to get him to bring you dinner up here.”

“That is exactly what I said.”

Khan smiled and Jim found himself looking away.

“Let’s eat before it gets cold. I’m _starving_.”

“Aren’t you always?” Khan commented as he sat down and helped himself to some roasted vegetables.

Jim froze. It was clearly just a passing comment, but it felt like a bucket of cold water had been dumped on him. Something must have shown on his face because Khan looked up from his plate and stopped what he was doing, looking at him expectantly. Jim forced his muscles to relax and sat down on his chair as casually as he could. “Yeah, I guess I have a fast metabolism.”

“Do you.”

What the fuck, that wasn’t even a question. “I think you should stop sticking your nose in other people’s business.”

“I merely asked you a question.”

“No, you took away my food!” Jim realized what he had just blurted out and banged a fist against the table in frustration. Why did he say that? He didn’t want to bring it up, he would have been content to just ignore it and pretend he had never noticed.

“I did,” Khan said softly. Jim didn’t look at him; he didn’t want to see the expression on the other man’s face. “I decided it was time to unpack my belongings and, as I was putting them away, I noticed there was food everywhere. I imagined it was rather complicated to keep track of expiration dates with everything scattered like that, so I gathered all of it and put it away in the black box next to the closet.”

Jim frowned. That box was Khan’s so he hadn’t looked inside. _Some_ people respected other people’s privacy. “You went through my stuff?”

Khan tilted his head. “Don’t get your knickers in a knot, Captain. I didn’t read your secret diary.”

“I don’t have a diary.”

“I know.”

Khan even had the nerve to smirk, that conceited bastard. Jim tried to swallow his anger for the sake of diplomacy while he helped himself to the chicken (a small portion, since Khan was watching him and it made him feel rather self-conscious now). “Why am I even doing this? I could be on a date right now.”

Khan’s smirk grew wider.

“I don’t know what you’re laughing at. I’m serious. I gave up a date with Abbey to do this with you and you treat me like I’m so beneath you or something.”

Khan went dead serious at that. “With Abigail Johnson?”

“Look at that, the genetically engineered genius got it right in one.” He was so angry, there was no coming back from it now. “Yes, Abigail Johnson. Abbey and I hit it off right away and we’ve been dating since,” he lied.

“Dating.”

“Is there an echo in here?”

“Abbey told me nothing of this.”

“Maybe she doesn’t want you to know.”

Khan looked suddenly uncertain and Jim heard in his own mind the sound of the augment’s heart cracking. He felt like a jerk but oh, there was something so incredibly intoxicating about manipulating powerful, arrogant Khan like this.

“What is it, Khan?” he asked, dropping his voice to a near whisper and leaning forward over the table, ready to twist the knife in. “Did I hit a nerve? Are you jealous?”

He knew it wasn’t true, if Khan was really not attracted to Abbey like he had said (and to women in general like Abbey had said), but then why did Khan’s eyes widen like Jim had just discovered his deep dark secret?

The other man took a deep breath and composed himself before Jim could come to any conclusions. “Your private life is none of my business, Captain.”

They ate the rest of their dinner in awkward silence. By the time they went to bed, Jim wished he could physically kick his own ass.


	18. The Catchy Song

Monday was a busy day, but not so busy that Jim couldn’t find the time to feel bad about what he had done to Khan. It wasn’t just that he had let his temper get the better of him and ruined his own plan to get closer to the augment. He _actually_ felt bad for him. The look on his face when Jim had planted the seed of doubt in the other man’s mind kept Jim awake for hours.

To top it all off, the first PADD his yeoman handed him that morning was Carol Marcus’ request for transfer. Jim swore under his breath, stamped an ‘Insufficient Grounds’ on it and handed it back. He knew it was about Khan, but she probably wasn’t going to dare write that down on her request. He hoped he could delay the matter long enough to figure out a way to change her mind.

He was failing on all fronts, it seemed. A valuable member of his crew wanted off his ship because of his decision to allow Khan on board, and he couldn’t even make said decision worth the trouble by getting Khan on his side. That damn augment was at the crux of all of Jim’s problems and there seemed to be no answer to them.

He met Abbey for lunch, hoping she would take his mind off Khan.

“So,” she said as she chewed on a bread stick, “you’re going to tell me why you blew me off last night?”

“I’m a busy man.”

“I know. But I came across Spock in the turbolift before I went to bed.”

“Oh?”

“Yeah, so I know it was ‘personal matters’.”

 _Busted._ “Okay, you got me. I had dinner with Khan.” Jim wasn’t sure what kind of reply to expect, but a shocked look was definitely not on the list. “Bones suggested we should try to make amends and put our animosity behind us, or whatever you wanna call it. It’s actually a good idea, really, so I said, why not? And it seemed like a priority right now, what with Khan joining us on away missions and us sharing quarters and everything, so I thought I’d ask you to do this--” he gestured between Abbey and himself “--at some other time and now we’re here, right? Don’t get me wrong, Abbey, I really like spending time with you and everything, but Khan and I are both very busy and he suggested we have dinner last night so... yeah....” Okay, enough blurting out excuses like a guilty man under interrogation. Babbling and lying was a dangerous combination. ‘Bones Suggested’, ‘Khan suggested’.... He didn't even know why he wasn't owning up to his ideas. What was there to feel guilty about?

“Okay,” Abbey said, modulating slowly as if unsure. “I’m happy to hear that you and Khan are spending more time together. He could really use another friend in here, you know.”

“Well, I don’t know about that...”

“Maybe someday. But for now you’ve made a lot of progress, from what you’re telling me.”

“I guess.”

“I’m just surprised that Khan didn’t tell me anything about this.”

 _Oops. Wonder why that is._ “Well, it was only last night. He’s probably been busy in sickbay this morning.”

“I met him for breakfast before his shift.”

She looked... hurt. Not as much as Khan last night, but still. Jim didn’t want to be the kind of jerk that breaks up friendships, so he took a deep breath and manned up. “I told him we were dating.”

“You _what_?”

“Yeah. And he was kind of upset that you didn’t tell him.”

“Why would you do that?!” Abbey was livid, the tendons on her neck tightening as she struggled to keep her voice down in the crowded mess hall.

“I don’t know, okay? I don’t know! I was angry because he went through my stuff while I was in sickbay and I cancelled my date with you just to watch him smirk at me like he’s oh so superior--”

“Date? What are you talking about, Jim?”

Wait, what?

“Jim? You still with me?”

“Huh?”

“I don’t know where you got this idea from, but last night wasn’t going to be a date, just like this isn’t a date.”

Well. Jim swallowed. Wow. Okay. He had been turned down many times before, and while it never stopped being a momentary blow to his ego, he always took it in stride and promptly forgot about it. But he hadn’t mistaken friendship for something more since he was in seventh grade, for god’s sake.

“Jim, I’m so sorry if I ever did anything to lead you on. You’re a great guy, and if circumstances were different I would definitely be interested in giving it a try. But right now it’d be a breach of Khan’s trust and I’ll never, ever do that to him. You understand that, right?”

No, he didn’t, but he had already made a fool of himself once. “Yeah, of course. Don’t worry about it, it’s no big deal. Listen, I have a meeting with Spock in half an hour and I need to finish a report before that. I’ll see you later, okay?”

He was a coward for bolting like this, yes, but right now he couldn’t care less. There was something that worried him much more, because if he had missed being friendzoned by the hottest chick on board after Uhura, it meant his mind was way too distracted by something else. And he knew exactly what, or rather who, that was.

\--

The way to get a catchy song out of your mind is to listen to it over and over again until it stops popping up in your head at random moments when you’re trying to focus on more important things.

As he hurried to the ready room where Spock was already waiting for him, Jim composed a quick text message, deciding he didn’t have time for a visit to the sickbay research labs or even for a voice comm. (Yeah, right.)

‘ _need 2 talk 2 u will u b in my quarters @ 8_ ’

Right before opening the door to the ready room, his communicator beeped. The incoming message read simply, ‘ _I sleep there._ ’

Jim took that to mean yes.


	19. The Interrogation

Ten minutes to eight, Jim was already showered and changed into clean clothes, pacing from the living-room to the bedroom and back like a man on trial awaiting his sentence. Yes, he had screwed up, but he was man enough to apologize, even to Khan. Didn’t mean he had to look forward to it, though. The door opened just when he was about to reach into the box where Khan had supposedly put away his protein bars.

“Good evening,” Jim said as a peace offer.

“Why did you lie to me?”

Uh-oh. Judging by that tone of voice, Khan was not happy. Jim walked back into the living room and took in the augment’s expression. Yep, definitely the opposite of happy. “If you talked to Abbey, then you know I didn’t--”

“You lied to me and you lied to her.”

“Oh, really? Look who’s talking.” Jim could feel the anger starting to take hold of him; exactly what he had planned to avoid, but Khan just got the better of him every fucking time. How dare that man, of all people, accuse him of lying? “If anyone’s a liar here, it’s you. I’m the one who should be demanding the truth.”

“I’ve been nothing but honest with you since I came aboard your ship for this rehabilitation charade.”

“Well, why don’t you prove it, hm? If you can.”

“If you would tell me exactly what it is that you think I’ve been lying to you about--”

“No, you don’t get to throw this back at me. Just tell me the truth for one fucking time, Khan.”

Khan steeled and crossed his arms. “Ask away, Captain.”

Jim didn’t expect the augment to cave in so quickly, so he drew a blank even though there were a thousand things he wanted to ask the other man. A question hovered at the edge of his mind and he grabbed it and blurted it out without checking what it was. “Are you planning to take over my ship?”

Oh. My. God. Had he really just said that out loud?

Khan’s expression changed oh so very slowly to something between disbelief and amusement. He shook his head and turned half away as if trying to hide his snigger. “No, Captain, I have no interest in ‘taking over your ship’, as you put it.”

“She’s an outstanding ship.”

“And needs a minimal crew of sixty eight people to navigate effectively.” He was probably just saying that to make Jim worry. It worked.

“Are you really making progress with your rehabilitation or are you just faking it?”

“Both answers apply, I suppose.”

“Don’t beat around the bush, Khan. You promised you would tell me the truth.”

“Did I?”

Jim didn’t dignify that with an answer. Instead, he crossed his arms and leaned against the bulkhead.

Khan looked down and swallowed. “I was...” He took a deep breath and started again. “I did things I never thought I would, to keep my family safe. The constant threat to their lives drove me to behavior that I understand is unacceptable in this future, behavior even frowned upon back in my time. But make no mistake, Captain. I am not so different from the person you think I am.”

“And who is that, exactly?”

“Someone whose priority has always been the safety of his people. I am prepared to do whatever it takes to protect them from their enemies and, if necessary, from themselves.” Translation: I have no sense of ethics but I love my family. Go figure.

“So why did you explicitly ask to do your rehab time on board the Enterprise, then?”

“Because I knew what to expect.”

“And what was that?”

“To be safe.”

That gave Jim pause. It had never crossed his mind that Khan might consider he was not safe on board other Starfleet ships. The augment knew the Enterprise crew hated his guts, to put it lightly, but he still took his chances with them. He must think the alternatives were far worse. “You think you are safe here?”

“I know what kind of man you are, Captain.”

“And you know my whole crew just as well?”

“No, but I trust your ability to command them.”

No. Jim did _not_ want to go there. He couldn’t dismiss those words when they were coming from someone who, morals aside, was obviously a true leader, but he was absolutely not okay with receiving reassurance from Khan, especially about something of so much consequence in his life. He could feel the anger quickening his pulse again and hurried to change the subject. “Why did you put my food away? And don’t give me bullshit about expiration dates.” When Khan didn’t reply right away, Jim pressed on. “Does it make you uncomfortable, my problem?” No point in pretending anymore; Khan obviously knew Jim had... issues.

“It makes _you_ uncomfortable. That is why you hide it from people, is it not?”

Jim sighed. “Why did you put my food away, Khan?”

“Believe it or not, Captain, I truly considered it would help you to keep your emergency provisions organized. Clearly, it upset you.”

“Yes, it did.”

Khan didn’t apologize.

“Why did you suddenly decide to unpack when I was in sickbay?”

“It was long overdue, wouldn’t you say?”

“Don’t. Just tell me the truth.”

Khan grimaced. It was a small gesture, hard to catch, but Jim noticed it anyway. The man was struggling with an admission and that made Jim even more eager to hear it. Finally, Khan spoke, his voice barely above a whisper. “I thought it would make you less likely to kick me out of your quarters.”

Oh. The last time they had seen each other before Khan had begun unpacking, Jim had been kicking and screaming at him in that abandoned house. If their roles had been reversed, Jim would have expected Khan to hate him after something like that, to never want to see his face again. Jim didn’t hate Khan for what had happened, though. He did hate him from before, of course-- wait, did he? Without the grief of Pike’s death so fresh in his heart, his feelings toward the augment weren’t so clear anymore. They had diminished and mutated to the point where he couldn’t really tell what they were, but he was certain it wasn’t hate. “Do _you_ hate me, Khan?”

Khan’s reply was immediate this time. “No.”

“Did you ever?”

“Yes. But I was mistaken.”

“So you regret what you did a year ago.”

“Some of it.”

Jim could tell that was a big confession for Khan. He was the kind of man that didn’t like being wrong, much less admitting to it.

“Do you feel... lonely?” Okay, where did that come from?

“I miss my family.”

“Have you made any friends since you woke up from cryosleep?”

“I consider Abigail my friend.”

“You’re not dating her.”

“I thought we had already established that last week.”

“Are you gay?”

The question startled Jim as it slipped past his lips. It obviously startled Khan too, because the other man froze, his expression changing into something resembling... fear? Jim knew the question was out of line but for the life of him he couldn’t open his mouth to take it back. He wanted, _needed_ , to hear Khan say it. It was a perverse obsession.

“That is none of your business,” Khan said after what felt like hours.

“I know. You don’t have to tell me.” Yeah, he kind of had to give Khan some leeway with this; he had been enough of a jerk already and Khan had actually let him, but it was obvious the augment didn’t want to yield in this particular subject. And he shouldn't have to. “Just so you know, if you were, I’d be cool with it. Most people would, actually. Times have changed, Khan.”

Khan looked at him with unreadable eyes. “I can see that.”

At a loss for what to do, Jim moved to the replicator. “I’ll get a sandwich. I missed dinner. You want anything?”

“Does that mean the interrogation is over?”

Jim smiled, his back to Khan. “For now.”

“In that case I'll have a sandwich, too.”

Jim replicated a couple of Kilm meat sandwiches and poured two glasses of water from the dispenser.

“Can replicators not synthesize water?” Khan asked.

“They don’t get the taste quite right. The best they can do is a plastic kind of taste. In my opinion it’s not so bad, but in everyone else’s opinion it makes you want to vomit, so they started equipping all starships with dispensers a few months ago. There’s this new technology that recycles water from air humidity pretty effectively, plus we have authorization to refill the ship’s tank at any Federation planet we visit.”

“It’s a pity such a comfort does not extend to shower facilities,” Khan said as they sat down at the table and began eating their dinner.

“Oh, tell _me_ about it! It’s been less than two weeks since we left Earth and I’d already sell my soul for a real water shower. I don’t know how I’ll ever go for five years without one.”

“Occupational hazards.”

“Yeah. I’m hoping I’ll be able to get one at Sahl Two.”

“Sahl Two?”

“Our next destination. Negotiations for their Federation membership have finished successfully and this Thursday a bunch of diplomats are holding a conference there to make the big announcement.”

“Sounds like a boring mission.”

“We’ll get more of those than anything else, I’m afraid. I wish we could explore strange new worlds and seek out new life and new civilizations all the time, but this is fifty percent interstellar travel, forty percent star charting, nine percent boring diplomatic missions and one percent adventure.” Jim smiled. “I live for that one percent.”

Khan smiled, too. “I’ve noticed. No adventure for you this time, though.”

“Oh, you never know. I’m a magnet for trouble, or so Bones keeps telling me.” There was some truth to that, he admitted to himself. Khan was trouble, for example, and Jim just couldn’t seem to get rid of the man. “We’ll actually be there for security support, not just to show off the Federation brand-new refurbished flagship. This is classified information, mind you, so you have to keep it to yourself, okay?”

“You can trust me.”

Jim looked at Khan as he considered those words. “Yeah. Anyway, the thing is, the Federation really wants Sahl Two to join as a member because their dilithium deposits are off the charts, but apparently there’s a local faction that thinks we want to plunder their planet and leave them impoverished or something. They call themselves the Sahlan Revolution.”

“And are they wrong?” Khan asked in a tone that implied he was inclined to agree with that faction.

“The Federation has very strict policies regarding acceptable courses of negotiation for natural resources between its members. We don’t _plunder_ , we trade.”

“Of course.” Khan didn’t sound convinced, but Jim had a whole year to change his mind with actual proof.

They ate in silence for a while. It was a comfortable kind of silence, a welcome change from their usual awkward ones.

“Well, this was nice, wasn’t it?” Jim said before putting the last bite of sandwich in his mouth.

“Alien meat is an acquired taste, I’m sure.”

“No, I mean this.” He gestured between the two of them. “We should do it more often, don’t you think?” he asked as he licked the mayonnaise off his fingers.

“It was quite... stimulating,” Khan said, eyes following Jim’s tongue.

Jim spluttered and quickly put his hand down. “It’s getting kinda late, isn’t it? We should go to bed. Let me go brush my teeth and then I’ll clear the bathroom for you.” Had someone tampered with the environmental controls or was that the heat of his own face burning with embarrassment? He practically ran to the bathroom and locked the door behind him.

What the fuck was the matter with him? Yes, he hadn’t had sex since they left Earth and he’d been getting his hopes up with Abbey only to be denied later, but he had gone on longer dry spells than this and his brain hadn’t started playing this kind of tricks on him, not since his teenage years anyway. Maybe he was more tired than he had thought... He brushed his teeth at full speed using a little bit more force than necessary, then took a leak and washed his hands and face. He noticed in the mirror that he was still blushing.

“Okay, all yours,” he said as he opened the door.

Khan, who was waiting by the table holding his folded pajamas, smirked. Jim’s face started feeling like it was on fire again, so he very maturely went into the bedroom and hid behind a privacy partition until he heard the bathroom door lock.

How the hell did they get from hating each other to... to _this_? Conspiratorial smiles and double entendres were dangerously close to flirting. Jim contemplated that scary thought as he pulled a clean pair of pajamas from the closet and started undressing. He could hear the sonic shower on the other side of the bulkhead and couldn’t help his mind from wandering off to places it shouldn’t be going to. His fantasies of a good old hot water shower on Sahl Two shifted and transformed until it was Khan standing under the spray, letting the water pour down his naked body as the glass walls of the stall went opaque with steam.

Fuck fuck _fuck_. Not _again_. He pulled on his pajamas and got under the covers. They tented obscenely around his hips so he turned on his side, facing away from the entrance so he wouldn’t have to look at Khan when the man came in. He tried to clear his mind to will his hard-on away, but his traitorous body would have none of that.

Khan came out of the bathroom far too soon. Jim heard his soft steps around the room as he got ready for bed. The fresh smell of his own shampoo on Khan's hair filled the bedroom. Jim shut his eyes tightly and pulled the covers up to his nose. Even after Khan lay down on his cot and the room went completely quiet, it was several hours before Jim fell asleep.


	20. The Unthinkable Thought

The following evening Jim was better prepared; he knew what to expect. He got as much work done during the day as he could and managed to wrap it up by six, at which point he checked if his quarters were Khan-free and hurried to go take a shower. A long shower. Yeah, one of those. So what? He wanted to take the edge off to prevent any more ‘accidents’, nothing wrong with that. Khan was, objectively speaking, a handsome man, and Jim was only human; certain involuntary bodily reactions were totally natural.

As he closed his eyes, the sonic waves turned to real water and hot steam in his mind, his new favorite fantasy. He imagined a second person in the shower, approaching him slowly but with purpose, fully clad in dark clothes despite the water spray.

_‘May I join you, Captain?’_

Jim leaned against the tiled wall, head thrown back. He palmed his hardening dick and curled his fingers around it.

_‘Allow me to help you with that.’_

He shuddered as the imaginary voice ghosted over his ear. He started tugging on his foreskin, falling quickly into a familiar rhythm. The tip of his tongue came out to lick his lower lip.

_‘What a fine body you have, Captain.’_

A fingernail trailed from his hip to his collarbone and Jim could have sworn it was real.

“Yessss...”

_‘I have been dreaming about this moment for a long time. Touching you. Tasting you. I would very much like to taste you, Captain.’_

“Please...”

The Khan in Jim’s mind was as assertive as the real one, but did things the other would never do, like get on his knees in front of Jim and blow him. His mouth was hot and wet and his tongue caressed the underside of Jim’s dick with just the right amount of pressure. Jim felt his own throat vibrate and realized he was moaning out loud.

“Deeper... More...”

In his mind’s eye, he put a hand on the back of Khan’s head and watched as his own dick disappeared inch after inch into that sweet mouth until Khan’s nose was pressed against his pubes.

He didn’t have any other coherent thoughts after that. His strokes became more and more urgent, his moaning louder. He came with a drawn-out grunt that didn’t sound like Khan’s name at all, but Khan was the only thing in his mind throughout it.

\--

He finished showering in five minutes and took another ten to shave and get dressed, then spiked his hair with gel. He was in that blissful post-orgasm state between invigorated and relaxed that never failed to put him in the best of moods. When he came out of the bathroom, Khan was sitting at the table sipping a cup of tea.

“Have you, uh, been here long?”

“I just came back from a session with Abigail.”

 _Phew!_ “So what did you two talk about?”

“That’s confidential.”

Jim smirked. “So you talked about me, huh?”

“Yes.”

Khan’s reply was so matter-of-fact that Jim did a double take. “Oh. Okay.”

“Would you like a cup of tea?”

“Uh, sure. And... dinner?”

“Very well.”

Jim sat down as Khan went to the replicator. It felt kind of weird, chilling like this while Khan poked around his tea cabinet and replicated a meal for him. Jim had shared daily chores with roommates before but it had never felt this strange.

Khan set the table with a second mug of hot tea, two bowls of salad and a plate full of chicken fingers. Jim reached for the tea and started sipping it, letting it burn his tongue.

“You have excellent taste in tea, Captain.”

_I would very much like to taste you, Captain._

Jim choked as the hot beverage went up his nose. “Please, call me Jim when we’re off duty,” he said between coughs.

“As you wish. Jim.”

The way Khan said his name did funny things to Jim’s insides. He took another sip of tea just to hide his face behind the mug. He was overreacting. “I’m hoping I’ll be able to squeeze at least half a day of shore leave on Sahl Two,” he commented in a clumsy attempt to change the subject. “I know we’ve only just started a five-year mission but I guess being grounded for a whole year is starting to make itself felt now.”

“You miss solid ground beneath your feet and sunlight on your face?” Khan said, the mockery in his tone clearly meant to be a shared joke.

Jim smiled. “Don’t get me wrong, I love space and I love my ship.”

“Of course.”

Jim studied Khan for a moment while the augment was busy with his salad. “Do you miss home?”

Khan took his time to reply, and when he did, he sounded calmer than Jim had ever heard him. “This is my home now, Jim.”

Jim didn’t know what to say to that, so he stuck his fork in a chicken finger and finished it in two bites, then helped himself to another one. “Sahl Two is a beautiful planet, apparently. There’s this place where a red river meets a cliff and pours down into the ocean below in a thousand-meter fall.”

Khan smiled. “A dream-like place.”

“Literally out of this world.” Jim chuckled. “Ever seen anything like that?”

“The Joga Falls in Karnataka are quite spectacular, but not even a quarter of that height.”

Jim liked the way the foreign words rolled off Khan’s tongue. “You know, the terms of your parole allow for up to ten days of shore leave a year whenever our missions can accommodate it, as long as you are accompanied by a Starfleet officer at all times.”

“Exactly my idea of fun,” the augment replied, rolling his eyes.

“Don’t you want to see the universe?”

“Not by myself. And a stranger following me around to make sure I don’t _misbehave_ \--” Khan made a face indicating exactly what he thought of that concept-- “is even worse.”

Jim’s heart went out to Khan, a man alone in an unfamiliar world. “You don’t have to be by yourself or with a stranger.” He took a deep breath and plunged on before he had time to change his mind. “We could go together.”

Khan eyed him warily. “ _We_.”

“Yeah. Like I said, I’ve been thinking about taking some time off on Sahl Two, and I’m a Starfleet officer so we wouldn’t have to bring anyone else along if you don’t want to. I can’t wait to take a real water shower--” _don’t go there don’t go there don’t go there_ “--and then we could go see that giant red waterfall if you want. It’s a win-win deal.”

“What would _you_ win?”

 _Damn it_. Jim raked his brains for a plausible lie. “I meant it’s win-win for you. You get a vacation on a beautiful planet, and you also get to go with me, not just the awesomest person in the entire quadrant--possibly the entire universe--but also someone you already know, so you’ll know what to expect. Looks like a good deal for you, my friend.”

“Friend.”

Jim suppressed a wince. Khan was always so focused on everything Jim said, scrutinizing every single word, judging him. Jim fell for it every single time, rising to the bait one way or another, and _god_ did he love it. “It’s a figure of speech,” he said in his best ‘duh’ voice, resting a hand on the table as he reclined in his chair.

“Of course.” Khan looked down at his salad. “So will your real friends be tagging along?”

Behind the strained nonchalance in the augment’s voice there was something that sounded almost like dejection. “We could make a deal,” Jim said without thinking. Because if he stopped for a second to think, he’d freak out completely. “I don’t bring any friends if you don’t bring any friends. What do you say?”

“Just the two of us?”

No. Oh god _no_. “Yeah.” His voice came out like a gasp. What the hell was he doing? “If that’s okay with you.”

Khan seemed to be considering the offer. Jim tried to tell himself he wanted the other man to turn it down, but who was he kidding? He couldn’t even squash that tiny, traitorous spark of hope inside himself that believed he’d get Khan to join him in the shower on Sahl Two and make his fantasies come true.

“I appreciate your offer,” Khan said. _Please say ‘but no thanks’, please say ‘but no thanks’..._ “I will consider it.”

“What’s holding you back?”

_Oh for god’s sake, Jim, shut the fuck up!_

Khan set a hand on the table right next to Jim’s. “I do not wish to make any...” he edged it closer until their fingers were a hair’s breadth away “...assumptions.”

Jim panicked and withdrew his hand. This was suddenly too _real_. The words were out of his mouth before he could stop them. “Then don’t.”

\--

He was an idiot. An idiot and a jerk. He pulled the covers over his head as if that would make the world disappear. A frustrated groan escaped his lips but was muffled by the sound of the sonic shower coming from the bathroom. What the fuck was wrong with him? First, leading Khan on like that; Jim was known for doing stupid things but that was crossing the line. And then... then, after teasing the man all throughout dinner, he had panicked at the last second like a fucking virgin. What a douche. He wanted to kick himself in the head until he passed out.

Khan took forever in the bathroom that night. When he finally came into the bedroom, Jim pretended to be asleep. He lay like that for a long time, eyes shut tight. By five in the morning it was obvious he wasn’t going to get any sleep, so he put on his uniform in the bathroom and left his quarters to try and get some paperwork done.

Under the shame and the self-hate, an unthinkable thought kept pushing at the back of his mind: Khan wanted him.


	21. The Three-Dinners Rule

“Jim, can you come by my office for a second?”

Jim pressed the comm button on the captain’s chair. “I’m on duty, Bones.”

“Doctor’s orders.”

“Damn it, Bones, do you _have_ to pull that card?”

“It’ll be ten minutes, I promise.”

“Yeah, it’s not like a have a choice, is it?” He sighed. “I’m on my way. Sulu, you have the conn.”

He took his time to get to Medbay. He was pretty sure he knew what his friend wanted to talk about, and it was not something he was particularly looking forward to, especially after last night. He had promised his friend he’d deal with the whole ‘Khan situation’ (god, that sounded ridiculous) and he had actually given it his best shot. It had been going pretty well too, considering, until everything went to hell. Story of his life: things going well until they went to hell.

He made his way into his friend’s office through the longer hallway to avoid the research labs. Or, more accurately, to avoid Khan.

“Jim,” Bones greeted him. “You haven’t been here since I discharged you from sickbay.”

“Why would I come here if I’m healthy?”

“You’ve been avoiding me.”

“No, I haven’t, Bones. I’ve just been busy. Is that so hard to believe?”

Bones pinched the bridge of his nose, letting his exasperation show. “Take a seat. You know what I want to talk to you about, don’t you?”

Jim sat down. “Yeah.”

“You promised you’d deal with it on your own.”

“Yeah.”

“And?”

“And what?”

“Are you?”

“Am I what?”

“Dealing with it, Jim! Don’t fuck around! Do I need to prescribe a mandatory psych eval?”

“No.” Jim sagged, sliding down in his chair. “No, you don’t need to do that. I am ‘dealing with it’ as you put it.”

“Tell me.”

“We... talked. He told me he meant to help me, which I knew, so I told him I knew, and apparently he already knew that I knew... My point is, we reached an understanding or whatever you want to call it, decided we’d spend more time together, and we’ve been doing just that.”

Bones gave him a wary look. “Just... what, exactly?”

Jim shook his head. “Have a little faith in me, Bones. We had dinner in our quarters.”

“Dinner. How did it go?”

“Not so well the first time, but the other two were pretty okay, I guess--”

“Wait a second, you mean this happened three times? Like, every night since you told me you’d deal with it?”

“Yes, we had dinner three times, Bones. What’s so wrong with that?”

“Didn’t you tell me just days ago that once was a business meeting, twice was a date? What’s three times, then? Going steady?”

“For god’s sake, Bones, Khan and I share quarters!”

“Yeah, so do Johnson and Ryxwhatshername and they eat at the mess hall like the rest of us.”

“That’s ‘cause they don’t have a living-room with a dining table.” Jim faked a grin and winked. “Captain’s privileges.”

“Jim--”

“Bones, I’m needed on the bridge,” Jim interrupted, standing up. “Do you need anything else?” He waited under his friend’s assessing gaze, feigning impatience.

“No, that’s all,” Bones said finally. “For now.”


	22. The Wrong Idea

When his shift ended, Jim headed straight for the rec rooms. He needed something to pass the time, anything that would take his mind off Khan and his body off his quarters (where Khan probably was). He replicated himself a glass of Saurian brandy, no ice, and sat down at the end of an empty couch.

“Captain Kirk.”

Jim looked up to see Abbey standing beside him, looking gorgeous as ever. She was holding a Martini glass, half-empty already. “Abbey, hey! How are you? And call me Jim.”

She gave him a demure smile. “Jim. I’m fine, just chilling out at the end of a long day.”

“Sit down, please.” She did, right next to him on the couch. “Long day?”

“Yeah, I thought I was done and then Doctor McCoy called me to his office. I just left fifteen minutes ago.”

Alarm bells went off in Jim’s head. “Doctor McCoy? What did he want?”

“To talk about Khan, what else? And...”

Jim finished his brandy in one gulp and raised his eyebrows in a gesture of encouragement. “And?”

“And you.”

“Me? He wanted to talk about _me_ with _you_?”

“Well, you and I are friends, aren’t we?” she said, flicking her head to get the hair out of her eyes.

“Yeah, yeah, of course.” He looked down at her glass, noticing it was now empty. “Want another drink?”

“Sure, thanks.”

He went to the replicator and got her a Cardassian Sunrise, then got another brandy for himself.

“So what did Bones want to know?”

“He said you told him you were spending more time with Khan. He wanted to talk about that.”

“What did you tell him?”

Abbey smirked as she sipped her new drink. “The truth, of course. Why? Was there something you wanted to keep secret?”

Fuck. Just how much did she know, exactly? And how much had she told Bones? “The truth? What truth?”

“Khan talks to me, you know. He tells me about each and every date you two have.”

“They are not dates.”

“Oh, you would know about that, hm?”

“Wait, he told you they were dates?”

“Nah,” she said, looking down. “I’m just messing with you. But he did tell me about that little interrogation number you pulled on him. Not very nice of you, by the way. And he told me you two discussed upcoming missions and waterfalls and water dispensers and water showers... you really like water, don’t you?”

“He told you all that?”

“He likes talking about you, is that so bad? He hasn’t made any other friends so far, and he’s very happy to be spending time with you and sharing stuff with you.” She finished her drink and handed him the glass. “Bring me another one, would you? I don’t know what it was but it was really good.”

“Cardassian Sunrise,” Jim said, standing up. “The secret is the melted frosting.”

“Wow, that thing must be packed with calories.”

“So is alcohol, but who cares?”

“Yeah, who cares?”

Jim came back with more drinks, unsure how to phrase his next question. “Did he tell you about yesterday, too?” Oops, maybe he had had a bit too much brandy.

“I assume you mean the invitation you extended him to go on vacation together?”

“I’d hardly call it a vacation. It’d be half a day at most.”

She leaned in closer. “Jim, you do know why he turned down your offer, right?”

Khan told her he had turned Jim down? “No. He... didn’t say.”

“Come on, Jim, put two and two together. He didn’t want you or anyone to get the wrong idea.”

“He told you that?”

“Not in so many words. You know Khan.”

“I don’t understand. Why would I get the wrong idea?”

“He doesn’t want you to think he’s coming on to you, obviously. He comes from a time and place where being gay is _wrong_ , so if he’s ever going to risk exposing himself, with all the consequences he thinks that implies, it’ll be for someone he really wants, not for a frail new friendship or even a one-night stand for that matter.”

Jim downed the last of his drink and stared at the empty glass. Khan _had_ come on to him last night, and Jim was sure that meant something important in light of what Abbey was telling him, something he was sure he could figure out if only he were a little bit more sober. Ah, fuck it. “I’ll go get myself another drink. Want one?”

“Please.”

\--

Empty glasses fell from the desk as it rocked under their combined weight. The sound of unbreakable glass hitting the floor filled the captain’s ready room, drowning their gasps and moans for just a moment.

“Oh god, Jim, yes! Harder!”

She was loud, too loud and too distracting. Jim just wanted to close his eyes and sink in her wet heat without having to think about anything or anyone, but images of water sprays and blue-green eyes and nearly-touching hands kept bombarding his brain so he thrust harder, too drunk to care if he was being rough.


	23. The Threat

After about five minutes of having his brain drilled into by a loud beeping sound, Jim finally caved and opened his eyes. The bright light hurt but as he became more and more awake a sense of urgency drove him to action.

He was in his ready room. There were at least half a dozen glasses scattered on the floor. Okay, he remembered now. He drank a little more than appropriate, considering he had alpha shift next morning, and... did he sleep with Abbey? No, he had to be making that up. She was nowhere in sight. Then again, his pants were undone and his shirt was missing.

He finally recognized the beeping sound: his communicator. It was coming from behind his desk. He went around it and... yep, there was his communicator. And his shirt. And Abbey.

He picked it up and checked what the beeping was all about. Six unanswered communications and localization requests. And it was ten to eight. Shit. “Abbey? Abbey, wake up. I’m on duty in ten minutes. I think something’s up, too. They’ve been looking for me.”

“Whaaa...?” She turned over, revealing a dark bite mark on her left tit.

“You need to get up. I gotta go and you can’t stay here like this. Damn it, Abbey, get off my shirt! I really have to go, it may be an emergency!”

“Emergency? What?” She opened her eyes (wow, she was slow in the mornings) and sat up. “What’s going on?” Her eyes widened. “Oh my god. Oh my god, no. No, Jim... tell me we didn’t.”

Jim picked up his shirt and pulled it on, smoothing out the wrinkles as best as he could. “We didn’t.”

“Yes, we did!”

“Then don’t tell me to tell you we didn’t! Look, I don’t have time to stay and talk about it, okay? I’ll send you a message later.” He started picking up the discarded glasses at full speed.

“Don’t treat me like one of your-- Oh god, _Khan_. Fuck, Jim, he can’t find out about this.”

“Yeah, yeah, I won’t tell him.”

“I mean it, Jim. This was a mistake, a very, very bad mistake. I’m not trying to blame it on you, I know it’s my fault, but I’m asking you not to-- Jim, look at me for just a second, please.”

Jim put the glasses in the recycler and turned to her. “You’re asking me not to tell Khan. Okay. I get it.”

“It’s very important that you don’t. His treatment depends on it.” She stood up, pulling the straps of her dress back over her shoulders. “He has very serious trust issues, Jim. He was just starting to recover and I... god, I’m so _stupid_.”

“Hey, don’t worry about it. Our secret’s safe. Honest.” She looked up at him, eyes full of doubt. “It’s not the first time I find myself in this kind of situation, you know. It’ll be like it never happened, I promise. Unless...” he smirked, looking her up and down. “Unless you want a second round?”

She rolled her eyes and picked up one of her shoes, making a show of looking for the other one. “Weren’t you leaving?”

“Right. Just call me when you feel like attending a repeat performance.”

He left the ready room pretending to feel content and a little bit naughty, but instead he found himself trying to push thoughts of Khan out of his mind yet again, struggling to focus on the potential emergency at hand.

\--

He didn’t expect the bridge to be so crowded. Even Bones was there.

“Jim! Where the hell have you been?” His friend looked at him up and down and frowned. “You look like shit.”

“We’ll talk about it later, Bones. What’s up?”

“Oh, you _do_ want to know. But you don’t answer your communicator, Khan said you weren’t in your quarters, and apparently you’ve hacked the main computer so that your location on the ship can’t be pinpointed.”

Jim smiled despite himself. “I forgot about that, I did it like a year ago. Didn’t they do a complete reinstall of all systems during the overhaul?”

“Captain,” Uhura cut in, “we received a transmission from the Sahlan government about ten minutes ago.” The emphasis on the amount of time came across a bit too reproachful, in Jim’s opinion. “They say it’s a video issued by the rebels.”

“On screen,” he ordered as he sat down on the captain’s chair.

The main viewscreen lit up as the video started playing. A red-skinned alien, clearly of Sahlan origin, was sitting at a desk, alone.

“Citizens of Sahl Two,” the Universal Translator interpreted as soon as the man started speaking. “My name is Der and I am in possession of critical information that has been kept from you.

“This morning, seven Federation representatives landed on our planet with the intention of tricking us into signing a dangerous contract that essentially entitles them to make use of our resources and our people in whatever way they see fit. And they were going to do this with the complicity of our leaders, the very people who were chosen by the skies to be our protectors.

“It is a proven fact that the Federation wants nothing but to profit from our efforts with no regard for our interests. Remember Theta Nu, or Vok, or Isllev Major and Isllev Minor, just to name a few examples of the many, many cases of worlds that have been pillaged and destroyed by this uncharitable alliance of wealthy planets that only want to get even wealthier at the expense of hard workers like us. They plunder entire worlds, taking away their natural resources and their technological advances, leaving only poverty and devastation.”

“Uhura,” Jim hurried to say, “relay this message to Starfleet Command.”

“Yes, sir.”

“Our leaders,” the Sahlan revolutionary continued, “blinded by greed, tried to convince us that we will be better off joining this alliance, that it will bring... prosperity. But we don’t need the Federation in order to be prosperous. We are Sahlans, and only Sahlans know what Sahlans need. We are gifted by the skies and we know how to thrive, like we’ve been doing for thousands and thousands of years since the Great Rebirth.

“Fellow citizens, brothers, sisters... it is time we take control of our destiny. This contract can _not_ be signed. It is with that goal in mind that we have decided to take action, once it became clear that our leaders were unwilling, or unable, to do it for us.

“At the third strike of the bell this morning, we intercepted and captured all seven of these Federation representatives --”

Jim grasped the armrests of his chair and slid closer to the edge. He felt Bones place a hand on his shoulder.

“--and we intend to hold them as prisoners in this orbiting ship, safely away from our land, until our leaders back out of the illegal decision they have made to sell us out like property. We will make sure this treaty is never signed. We consider it our civil duty to protect Sahl Two from any threats, be they foreign or domestic, when the chosen leaders are incapable of complying with the will of the people.

“We will proceed to list the names of our prisoners for the record. Bressman, Anna. Mai, Segad. McNeil, John--”

“Sulu, what is our ETA to Sahl Two?”

“One minute, thirty two seconds, sir.”

“Get us as close as you can to that ship without getting us into weapon range.”

“I’m on it.”

“Sir, incoming transmission from Starfleet Command, coming in on secure channel.”

“Let’s hear it, lieutenant.”

“Captain Kirk,” a deep voice resounded from the speakers.

“Admiral Bowles, sir. We have a situation here.”

“I am aware; we received your transmission. These Sahlan rebels are holding seven Federation ambassadors hostage.”

“So it would seem. We’ll be arriving at their location in a few seconds.”

“Kirk, I have no other ships in the sector. I need you to take care of this. Specifically, your orders are to rescue all the hostages without compromising the new alliance with Sahl Two. I want this treaty signed before the weekend.”

Jim ran a hand through his hair. Well, he had pulled through in missions ten times as hard; the augment in Medbay was living proof of that. “Understood, Admiral.”

The transmission ended just as the Enterprise pulled out of warp. A ship of unknown yet somewhat familiar design, about half the size of a Constitution-class, was visible on the main viewscreen ahead of them, right in front of the red surface of Sahl Two.

“Uhura, hail the rebels, I want to talk to them. Spock, report.”

“Our scanners are unable to provide conclusive data, Captain. The enemy ship possesses a tight shield that I have never encountered before. It is impossible to obtain relevant information on either the inside or the outside of their vessel with our current resources.”

“Keep working on it, and record all data, no matter how insignificant it might seem. Uhura, have we made contact with the alien ship yet?”

“No, sir. They are not answering our hails. I’m trying all frequencies.”

Jim looked at the alien ship on the viewscreen for a moment, a wild idea forming in his mind. “Spock, download any data you’ve managed to gather on this ship to a PADD and call all senior staff to an emergency meeting in Briefing Room B. I’ll be there in ten minutes.” He stood up.

“Jim?” Bones asked. “Where are you going?”

“Out on a limb. We’ll see if it leads somewhere.”

“Captain.” Spock handed him a PADD.

“Thank you, Commander. Let me know if you find anything else.”


	24. The Essential Asset

Time was of the essence, but Jim still took a few seconds outside the Medbay research labs to observe Khan while the man was not aware of his presence. He was standing alone at a table, preparing some kind of solution that appeared to require exact measures. From this angle Jim couldn’t see his face.

“Khan?”

The augment froze, arms stopping mid-action, neck going visibly rigid. “Kirk,” he said. Jim couldn’t tell if he sounded angry or upset or what, but he was definitely not in the best of moods.

“Can I ask you something? It’s work-related,” he hurried to clarify, “and it’s an emergency.”

Khan turned around. “If my answer will prevent this ship from being blown to pieces, thus ensuring my continued survival, I’d be agreeable to help you with any questions you have.”

Angry it was, then. “The Enterprise is not in danger yet, but there _are_ lives at stake.” He handed him the PADD. “Do you recognize this ship? It looks like it could be Starfleet, but it’s not, as far as we know.”

Khan gave the PADD a quick glance and took on a smug expression. “I see why they made you captain. You have good instincts.”

Jim filed the comment for later inspection. “So you do recognize it?”

“I never thought this one would see the light of day. Or, rather, the darkness of space. Marcus thought she was too small to be of any use, and we were never able to increase the size without losing shielding capability.”

“You mean...?”

“The Vengeance wasn’t the only ship I designed for Marcus.”

Jim grimaced. If a Starfleet ship had been stolen by the Sahlan revolutionaries, there were bound to be Starfleet officers involved. “So you know this ship, inside and out.”

“Yes.”

“What are its strengths, its weaknesses?”

Khan handed the PADD back to him. “She’s impenetrable. Nothing short of a warp core detonation can get through those shields. But her maximum speed is warp two. You could easily outrun her.”

“I don’t want to outrun her. I want to disable her without hurting anyone inside.”

“You will have to do that from within, then.”

Jim nodded. “How?”

“She has a blind spot, where the shields let transporter beams through.”

“The transporter room.”

“Just the pad,” Khan corrected him.

“Is it always open, this gap, or do they enable it only when they have to use the transporter?”

“Closing it takes up large amounts of energy, so they should normally keep it open, considering very few people in the galaxy know about this chink in their armor. But they _will_ close it as soon as you beam someone over.”

“Of course. So we can only send up to six people, and we can’t pull them out unless they manage to overtake the ship and disable the shields.” He sighed. Well, it was something. “Thank you, Khan. I mean it. Your help will save lives and diplomatic relations. Starfleet appreciates it.”

Khan sneered. “What a surprising turn of events,” he said in a dry tone, turning around and continuing his research work. The conversation was over.

\--

“Captain, may I remind you that time is a valuable resource at present and--”

“At ease, Spock,” Jim cut him off, sitting down at the meeting table. “I come bearing juicy information.”

“You’ve talked to Khan?” Bones asked.

“Seriously, Bones, you should get your esper rating re-tested.”

“He knows the ship,” his friend deduced.

“Better yet, he designed it.”

“Weel then, spill it, Cap’n.” Scotty sounded more excited than worried, probably because he couldn’t wait to get his hands on those brand new shields.

“The ship has to be taken from the inside,” he explained, “there’s no way around that. Khan says the shield is impenetrable, but it has a blind spot on their transporter pad that the rebels can close at their discretion. Which they will, as soon as we beam anyone on board. So if we’re going to do this, we only get one shot. Six people.”

“Given the size of the vessel, I estimate a crew of two hundred and five, in addition to the seven hostages we are tasked with rescuing,” Spock said.

“Not the best odds, I know. But where there’s a will there’s a way, right?” Jim took a deep breath and plunged on. “We have an ace up our sleeve,” he said, and waited for everyone to catch on to what he was suggesting. It was Bones who jumped first, of course.

“Do you have hay for brains? Remember what happened last time you tried to board a ship with Khan?”

“This is different, Bones.”

“Oh, really? Because this time you’re not asking him to go with you for his knowledge of the ship’s design, right? Oh, wait, you are. Well, maybe this time he’s not the one who actually designed it. Oh, wait, he _is_.”

“Bones--”

“Or maybe this time there’s no hostages whose lives you need to protect. Oh, wouldn’t you guess, there are!”

“Bones--”

“No, Jim, you listen to me. Don’t make the same mistake again. How many people lost their lives last time?”

Jim closed his mouth. What could he say to that? It was all true, after all.

“Captain, if I may.”

“Yeah, Spock, go ahead. Since when do you need my permission to tell me how crappy my ideas are?”

“On the contrary, Captain. I believe your implied suggestion is quite logical. If we have to overtake this vessel with only six of our men, detailed information of the ship’s design is an essential asset.”

“Khan is a dangerous murderer,” Jim countered. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Scotty nod. “Bones is right, we tried this once before and it was a catastrophe.”

“Circumstances were significantly different. Khan does not have any personal investment in this mission other than showing concrete evidence of the effectiveness of his treatment with the aim of obtaining further benefits in his probation period. It is in his best interest to aid in the safe retrieval of the hostages and the protection of Starfleet property.”

“I don’t think Khan is very fond of Starfleet,” Bones commented.

“That’s another thing,” Jim said. “The ship belongs to Starfleet, or at least the design does. That means we can expect Starfleet officers to be involved. There may even be some aboard. If I put Kahn there...”

“Are we willing to risk it?” Bones asked.

The room went quiet for a moment. The silence was broken by a beep from the console. “Captain,” Uhura’s voice followed, “the rebel ship has answered our hails. They wish to speak with you.”

“Hold them for a moment and stand by for further orders, lieutenant.”

“Yes, sir.”

“Well, gentlemen,” he said to his officers at the table, “we’re running out of time. We’ll probably end up having to beam six of us over there and I’ll be one of them. That’s non-negotiable,” he clarified before Bones had time to protest. “They want to speak to the captain of the Enterprise and soon I’m not going to be available. Spock, I need you to take their calls and pretend to be the captain. It won’t be hard for you, I’m sure.” Bones didn’t seem to appreciate the joke much. Spock only nodded in acknowledgement of his orders. “I need four security officers.”

“You’re taking Khan?”

“Yes, I am, Bones. If he wants to come. Spock, this is probably a suicide mission, so I’m making it volunteer-only. No one has to come if they don’t want to. I’m going to talk to Khan now. Have someone keep me updated on your conversation with the rebels. Make sure we can create some kind of distraction in about fifteen minutes so we can beam over. And have those four security officers ready in the transporter room by then.”

“Yes, sir.”

Now he only had to convince Khan to go on another doomed-to-end-in-disaster mission with him. How many times could he get away with that?


	25. The Déjà Vu

“Déjà vu,” Khan said as soon as Jim entered the lab. “You come to ask for my help in boarding a technically illegal Starfleet ship that I designed. Once again.”

Jim crossed his arms. “I need to know, is it going to end as badly as last time?”

“I don’t predict the future, Captain.”

“It’s Jim.”

Khan gave him an assessing gaze that he couldn’t help but fidget under. “I was under the impression that this was official business.”

“Look, I’ll be honest with you, Khan. We made a great team on the Vengeance, if you don’t count anything that happened after we reached the bridge. We managed to board her and take control of her against all odds. I need that kind of rapport right now.” He took a step forward. “We’ve got seven hostages on that ship and they need you. _I_ need you.”

Khan narrowed his eyes. “And the Federation needs dilithium.”

“Politics,” Jim said, shrugging. “Right now all I care about are those seven lives.”

“And you trust me not to try to kill you again?”

“I do,” he replied right away. Wasn’t it obvious?

His answer seemed to take Khan by surprise, though, because the other man looked perplexed and quickly turned away, busying himself with switching off the spectrometer he had been working with. “Is Commander Spock creating a diversion?”

“Yes,” Jim answered. Kahn always guessed right. What wouldn’t Jim give to have a first-hand look at those thought processes? If only he were a Vulcan and could join their minds.

“Then let us not waste any more time,” Khan said, walking out the lab and leaving Jim standing there.

Wait, had the man really just agreed to help him? Just like that? No conditions, no favors in exchange?

“We’ll probably die,” Jim called back at him.

“We all do, at some point.”

\--

The transporter room was crowded. It seemed like everyone and their mother was there, except for Spock, whose conversation with the rebels was being broadcasted shipwide from the bridge.

“I understand your concerns, Mr Der,” he was saying, “but subspace transmissions have a set velocity that I cannot improve at this time. If you would agree to speak to a Starfleet officer in Starbase fifty-seven instead of Admiral Bowles in Starfleet Headquarters, communication would be established eighty seven point four zero one percent faster.”

Jim snickered. Spock was a master at bending the truth to suit his needs; that eighty-seven percent represented only a few milliseconds. “All right, people, let’s go over the plan one last time, okay?” He joined the rest of the party on the transporter pad. “We’ll be beaming over to their transporter room. It’s a small area and we estimate no more than two hostile individuals there, armed. Coopman, Dasse, you take them out and head left toward the brig, the most likely location of our hostages. Arnold, Nychka, you check the cargo bay. Khan and I will head right to Engineering and attempt to disable security systems, weapons and external shields, the latter being the topmost priority. Remember, we can’t get out of there unless we disable those shields, so if anything happens to Khan or myself, the rest of you take up where we left off. And we all keep in touch at all times, understood?” Four voices acknowledged his orders. Jim sighed. “Understood, Khan?”

“Yes.”

“Good. Don’t forget, we keep our eyes wide open and our phasers locked on stun. Take your places.”

He stood at the back of the pad, letting Coopman and Dasse take the front, and unholstered his phaser to be as ready as possible; they had no real idea what they would be facing when their atoms rematerialized on the other ship. Out of the corner of his eye, he caught Khan slicking his hair back with his hand. It was such a casual gesture that Jim’s mind got completely sidetracked for a moment.

“Captain, coordinates locked,” the Ensign behind the controller said.

Jim was back to the present at once. “Ready, people?”

This time, five voices assented.

“Energize.”

The enemy transporter room and the dozen people in there came into view before his atoms finished re-assembling.


	26. The One Percent

As soon as he could move, Jim aimed his phaser at the closest red-skinned guy and fired, managing to hit the man's leg. He kept firing as he looked for cover, but there was nowhere to hide. They were completely exposed. Phaser shots were flying everywhere, bouncing off the walls, their zapping noises mingling with the shouts and screams. Jim kept firing blindly, not sure if he was actually hitting any targets. He crouched down just in time to duck a shot and before he could stand back up something fell on him, hitting his shoulder hard. His eyes caught a bundle or red-clad arms.

“Left!” a familiar voice shouted in his ear, and Jim turned and fired without thinking.

Everything went quiet then. Jim looked up to see Khan standing in the middle of the transporter room, arms extended, a phaser in each hand.

“We have to move,” the augment said, holstering one of his weapons and helping Dasse up.

Coopman and Nychka started gathering the phasers of the fallen Sahlans. Jim looked down and confirmed the body lying next to him was Arnold’s. His eyes were vacant but his limbs were still shaking.

“Kirk, the shields.”

“Right, right.” He stood up, rolling his shoulder. “Nychka, go with Coopman and Dasse. I don’t want anyone by himself.”

“Yes, sir.”

Jim bent down to pick up Arnold’s phaser, but it wasn’t there.

“I’ve got it,” Khan said, tossing it to him before grabbing another one from the transporter console where Coopman had set the gathered weapons.

“All right, people,” Jim said, stashing the second weapon between his back and his belt, “let’s get going. Remember, Khan and I to Engineering, you three to the brig, Medical and cargo bay.”

Khan approached the doors phaser in hand. As soon as they slid open, he fired a shot. A loud thud followed. “Clear,” he announced.

Jim followed him to the right, rounding the corner. The hallway was mysteriously deserted.

“I don’t like this, Khan.”

“Engineering is three levels below. Stay close, Kirk.”

“Where _is_ everybody?”

He almost bumped into Khan when the augment suddenly stopped. Half a second later, the sounds of heavy phaser fire started coming from behind them, round the corner. Fuck, his men were under attack. Jim turned around without thinking, but a steely hand grabbed his arm.

“Let me go, Khan! They need my help!”

“We need to disable the shields _now_.”

“I don’t have time to argue. Go get the shields, I’ll stay behind.”

The hand on his arm clenched.

“My people are in danger, Khan.”

Khan grimaced. “I’ll stay.”

It was a giant leap of faith, trusting Khan with the lives of his men, but there was no time to think, so Jim went by instinct. “Fine.”

Khan let go of his arm and Jim wasted no time, sprinting down the hallway without looking back.

With all the commotion their little stunt in the transporter room had caused, plan A (turbolift) was out of the question. That left plan B (Jefferies tube) and Jim prayed to god it worked because there was no plan C. He reached a tube opening and, peering inside just in case, started climbing down. He was about to reach the Engineering deck when he heard voices coming up the tube.

“...up in the transporter room,” a man with a thick accent was saying.

“How many?” a second man asked in perfect Standard.

“Six. One dead, one missing.”

“I’ll be right there. Have someone check the computer to locate the missing one and get more men down here. They’ll want to disable our shields.”

Jim heard them scurrying away and hesitated, worried for the rest of his team.

“Coopman? Nychka? Dasse?” he asked into his communicator. “Khan?” No reply.

One thing was certain, though: he had to get to Engineering before the enemy backup arrived, or he’d miss his window. Twelve lives depended on that, including his own.

He half-climbed, half-slid down the remaining steps and dashed down the hallway toward Engineering. The place was conspicuously deserted, and far more complex than what Jim had imagined from Khan's description.

Too much to do, too little time, so Jim set to work right away. Shields first. He located those controls almost immediately, a sizeable tower unit exactly where Khan had said it would be. He hesitated. He could really put the ‘pro’ in programming, but hardware wasn’t exactly his area of expertise. The console was nothing like the one on the Enterprise or anything Jim had studied at the Academy, and time hadn’t allowed for a lengthy explanation from Khan. He looked around to confirm the place was still empty and reached for his communicator again.

“Khan, you there? I need you.”

“Who’s there?” came a voice from the other side of the shield control unit.

Jim plastered himself against the side of the unit, phaser in hand. He strained his hearing to listen for any signs of movement over the sound of blood rushing in his ears. There were steps right around the console, approaching. Now or never. With a swift spin he came out of hiding, both arms stretched forward and pointing his phaser right at the face of his opponent.

The man, a Sahlan dressed in what appeared to be a uniform, raised his hands without being told. They were empty.

“Hand over your weapons,” Jim ordered just in case.

“What weapons?”

“Any weapons you’re carrying. Now.”

“Who are you?”

“I said _now_!”

The man’s eyes flicked to a spot behind Jim. With a surge of adrenaline Jim readied himself to turn around and fire, but the cold barrel of a phaser was pressed into the back of his head before he could react.

“Stand still,” the man behind him said. His voice rang a bell somewhere in Jim’s mind. “Garz, take his things.”

The Sahlan man in front of him took a step closer and put his hand on Jim’s phaser. Jim let him pry it off his fingers; no point in resisting at this moment. His communicator and second phaser were also taken away.

“You knew exactly what console to go to, didn’t you?” the man behind him said. “How did you get the blueprints for this vessel, Captain Kirk?”

Jim cringed. “I’m afraid you’re confusing me with someone else.”

“I have no time for uncooperative prisoners. Stand against the wall, hands and feet apart.”

Jim turned slowly and moved toward the bulkhead as told; the other man remained out of Jim’s sight at all times. He placed his hands on the wall on either side of his head, fingers splayed out. The phaser at the back of his head was suddenly pressed into him with force until his forehead touched the cool metal in front of him.

“I demand to speak to your captain,” Jim said, playing for time.

“You demand? You _demand_? I asked you a question and you ignored me, Kirk. I don’t give second chances. On your knees.”

Jim’s heart skipped a beat. He knew this was almost certainly just an intimidating move meant to scare him into talking, but his survival instincts kicked in, screaming at him to run for his life. He got down on his knees as told, though, hands never leaving the wall. Just a bit more time, that was all he needed. He'd think of something.

“The captain of the Enterprise is a valuable chip," his captor was saying, "but we already have seven ambassadors in sickbay and I’ll tell you up front, Kirk, I don’t like you. I’m so sorry you were accidentally killed in the shooting when you attacked us.”

“What?” the Sahlan man asked, echoing Jim’s thoughts.

“And I’m so sorry Kirk shot you, Garz.”

Jim felt the phaser leave his head and next thing he knew, a shot went off and a body dropped to the floor. Garz’s red-skinned arm came into view by Jim’s side, Jim’s own phaser and communicator still in his hand.

This man was insane, whoever he was. He really meant to kill Jim, not caring if he had to murder a fellow shipmate to get away with it. Well, Jim wasn’t about to kneel there and let himself be killed, not without putting up a fight. He ducked and reached for his phaser in Garz’s hand, but before his fingers even got close to it a shot blasted right behind him and Jim felt the life drain out of him in a rush.


	27. The Burn

The shot was followed by a scream, and Jim was sure it was his. He patted the back of his head, his body too numb to feel the wound. The wall in front of him was splattered with blood... he was bleeding to death...

A hand grabbed his.

“Jim?”

There was someone beside him but he couldn’t quite process what he was seeing.

“I don’t want to die again,” he found himself saying. His voice was unexpectedly steady for a dying man.

“Then pull yourself together and help me take down those shields.”

Jim blinked, trying to get himself under control. He was alive. He was _alive_ and he was unhurt. Khan was crouching by his side, holding his hand. “Khan. Oh, thank god.”

“Can you move?”

“Yeah.” He turned around to see a human body lying behind him; the face was familiar. “Hey, isn’t that Davis?”

“Was,” Khan answered, standing up and pulling Jim with him.

Jim frowned. Davis had been in all his Command classes at the Academy. He had seemed like a nice guy. “Where’re the others?”

“Your men are safe. They’re looking for the hostages in Medbay.”

“We’re running out of time. I heard they were sending more people down here.”

“Yes,” the augment said simply. He picked up Jim’s phaser and communicator and thrust them into Jim’s hand, then moved to the console and set to work on disabling the shields. “Cover me.”

Jim felt a mixture of empowerment and apprehension at those words. Khan trusted him to protect his life, but the task was a tricky one, considering he had to cover the whole Engineering deck.

“Starboard entrance,” Khan indicated, not looking up from his work.

Sure enough, a second later three armed Sahlans came in through precisely that access. Jim aimed and shot, managing to take down one of them before they started returning fire. A shot hit Khan on the shoulder and he recoiled, but kept working.

Then six more Sahlans came in through the stern passageway and all hell broke loose. Jim plastered himself against the side of the console and kept shooting, but it was impossible to take proper aim under heavy fire like this, so he was going blind. Each phaser shot that bounced off the walls and computing units around him sent an imaginary burst of pain through his body as if he had been hit for real. “How much longer, Khan?” he shouted over the blasts.

“A few more seconds, hold on!”

Another shot hit the augment on the same shoulder and he fell to his knees. Jim panicked.

“Khan?!”

But Khan wasn’t a superman for nothing. He pulled out not one but two phasers and started fighting back, console forgotten. His aim was impeccable, and the Sahlans started dropping like flies.

“Starboard!” he shouted.

Jim obediently turned away and started shooting in the indicated direction. Something scorching hot grazed his side and he knew it wasn’t an imaginary wound this time. “Fuck, I’m hit!” He meant to shout the warning but it came out as a gasp. His legs started giving way-- _no, no, no!_

Everything went quiet.

No, not quiet. There just wasn’t any more fire. He leaned most of his weight on a panel and turned his head. Khan was working at the console, eyes flicking rapidly between the screen and Jim himself.

“Hang on, Jim, just a second.”

It was a little harder than usual to understand what was being said to him. That couldn’t be a good sign. “I’m okay,” he said anyway.

“Done,” Khan announced, and was by Jim’s side in an instant, helping him stand straight. “Shields will be disabled in three minutes, thirty seconds.”

“That long?”

“The safety delay is hardwired, it can't be overridden. Can you walk? We need to get out of here.”

Jim put a hand on the panel and took a faltering step. Khan grabbed his waist on the uninjured side. Jim wondered if the augment meant to carry him, and with a tiny shudder tried twice as hard to get his legs working. It got easier with each step. Maybe the wound wasn’t so deep.

“Can you reach my communicator?” he asked.

Khan got his hand in Jim’s pants pocket --Jim couldn’t help but snicker at that, despite the circumstances-- and took out the communicator.

“Enterprise, this is Khan. Shields will be disabled in about three minutes. Stand by. We require immediate backup.”

“Acknowledged.” It was Spock’s voice. “Is the captain with you?”

“He is. Khan out.” He pressed another button on the device. “Coopman, do you read me?”

“This is Dasse,” came a voice from the other side, half-drowned in zaps and explosions. “We’ve located the hostages but we’re under attack.”

“Copy. Backup is coming in three minutes. Where are you?”

“Secondary corridor to sickbay.”

“I’m on my way.” He put the communicator back in Jim’s pocket. “We need to get you somewhere safe.”

“No way, I’m coming with you.”

“There’s an airlock at the end of this hallway,” Khan said as they turned a corner.

“Are you crazy? That’s like the least safe spot in the entire ship!”

“I’ll lock it. Do you not trust me?”

“I do, but my men need me, Khan.”

“You’re in no condition to be of any help to them right now.”

The unmistakable sounds of battle reached them from the other end of the deck. According to Khan’s descriptions of the ship, though, Medbay was several decks up. Jim picked up his step but Khan pulled at his arm. Not hard enough to stop him, though, so he kept going.

“I can’t just hide it out, Khan!”

“Do you want to get killed?”

They turned another corner and stopped in their tracks. In front of them were three Sahlans standing behind a human, all four aiming their phasers at them. Khan pulled out his phaser but didn’t shoot. Jim was thankful for that decision because three of the weapons were pointed right at Jim’s head.

“Well, well,” the human said. “What do we have here?”

“Surrender now, Haden, and I might spare your life,” Khan threatened. They knew each other?

Haden let out a short, forced laugh, then reached out and plucked the phaser off Khan’s hands. Khan let him. “Spare my life, hm?” He looked at Khan up and down and turned to Jim. His green eyes narrowed but his smirk grew wider. “I wonder, what is the captain of the Enterprise doing with Marcus’ little bitch?”

Jim felt Khan stiffen beside him.

“It's obvious, though, isn't it,” Haden continued. “Admirals, captains... My, my, Khan. You’re a real gold digger, aren’t you?” Haden reached for Jim’s holster to take away his phaser but Khan was faster. He got to the phaser first and, moving quickly to stand in front of Jim, fired three shots, taking down all Sahlans before they had time to shoot back.

Haden pointed his phaser at Khan’s head, then over Khan’s shoulder at Jim’s head. His hands were shaking. “Put your phaser down, Khan, or I’ll kill him!”

At the end of the corridor, shots were still being fired and people were shouting.

“Fuck you, Haden,” Khan said then, and with a twist of his left hand pushed Haden’s weapon away as he fired his own phaser between the man’s eyes. Haden fell but Khan fired another shot, then another. He kept shooting, emptying the phaser on Haden even as the man lay limp on the floor.

“Stop!” Jim shouted. The weapon was set on stun, but no human could take that much phaser energy. Khan kept shooting, heedless of Jim’s orders. Jim grabbed the augment’s arm even though it was like trying to move Thor’s hammer. “Khan, stop! You’ll kill him!”

Someone came running round the corner and Khan raised the phaser to point it at them. The newcomer stopped and put his hands up in the universal gesture of ‘don’t shoot’. It was Spock.

“Captain, Khan. The ship is secure. The hostages are being beamed over to the Enterprise as we speak. They are unharmed.”

Khan lowered his weapon as Sulu, Jackson and Cupcake came round the corner behind Spock. Jim sighed and leaned back against the bulkhead.

“Sir, you need medical attention.”

“I’m fine, Spock,” Jim lied out of habit, and with a last look at Haden’s severely burnt face, added, “Let’s go, there’s a ton of paperwork to do.”


	28. The Center Of It All

Jim woke up from the surgery feeling nauseous and disoriented; general anesthesia never sat too well with him. Bones was standing beside him going on and on about sedatives and suicidal missions and teenage crushes, of all things. Jim couldn’t make any sense of his friend’s words, so he closed his eyes again and promptly fell back asleep.

When he woke up the second time, a nurse was checking on him. After letting her run pointless scans on him and confirming he was fine, he’d be out of sickbay by noon the next day, it was the middle of gamma shift and “no, sir, Doctor McCoy is not available at the moment”, he settled back in his bed and stared at the ceiling in hopes of boring himself to sleep. But every time he started dozing off, he was jerked awake by Khan’s voice in his mind, spitting out a hateful ‘fuck you’ through gritted teeth.

He finally gave up sleeping altogether and let his mind run in circles around Haden and Marcus and threats and abuse and the weirdness of Khan cussing.

\--

True to the nurse’s word, Bones released him at noon the next day on the promise that he’d take it easy for the rest of the week. Considering it was Friday, Jim concluded his wound had been only superficial. That, or Bones had completely lost track of time. Just in case, he didn’t ask.

He went to his quarters as soon as his friend let him go, but there was no trace of Khan there. Not just the man himself was missing, but also all of his stuff in the closet and the bathroom. Even his cot was gone. Only the black box remained, with Jim’s food inside. Jim ripped open the package of a protein bar and devoured it in three bites.

As an afterthought, he commed Spock.

“Khan has been re-assigned to cabin six C zero fifty eight on deck six, Captain. Construction work ended yesterday at eighteen hundred hours.”

Oh.

At a loss for what to do, Jim took off his boots and pants and pulled down the covers of his bed to lie down. Something peeking out from under his pillow caught his attention and he reached for it. It was a worn paper book. The cover read ‘Moby Dick’.

Intrigued, especially because he knew who had left it there, Jim opened it on the very first page. There was a hand-written note on the otherwise blank paper. It read, ‘With love, from Sheerah’. The ink was faded, especially the name Sheerah. He turned to another random page in the middle. There was a word feebly underlined in old-fashioned graphite pencil (‘become’) and a spiral doodle on the upper right corner. He flipped the pages quickly and noted there were several words underlined and occasionally a spiral or triangular doodle in a corner. He spent about two hours trying to figure out the connection between all the underlined words and eventually gave up and just put the book up to his face and took a deep breath through his nose. The smell was pleasant and reminded him of Khan somehow, even though he was pretty sure Khan didn’t smell like old paper books.

He occupied himself with re-reading the highlighted words and letting them flow through him, not trying to decode any hidden messages this time. He imagined each of them in Khan’s voice, and as sleep claimed him, his mind tricked him into believing Khan was whispering in his ear.

\--

When he woke up again, his communicator told him it was ten p.m. and the comm panel indicated he had eight unread messages. He felt kind of groggy, unused to sleeping through the better part of a whole day like this, but still got up and went to get some water while the computer read him his messages aloud. He didn’t bother with pants; after all, he had his quarters all to himself again. It was what he wanted, right? It was okay, he could get used to the silence and the solitude once more. Humans were creatures of habit, after all.

Four of the messages were from Bones, surprise, surprise. Jim told the computer to delete them without listening to them. He’d get his head chewed off for it later, he knew, but right now he didn’t care.

Sulu’s voice followed. “Captain, on behalf of the whole alpha shift bridge crew, congratulations on another successful mission, sir. May there be many more in the five years to come.” Jim smiled as he sipped his water.

Next was a message from Spock. “Captain, the treaty has been successfully signed at nineteen hundred hours today. Sahl Two is now officially a member of the Federation. Admiral Bowles has indicated he expects a call from you as soon as the state of your health permits it.” Ah, paperwork. It was never done.

There was also a message from Scotty, going on and on about the new shielding technology and how it could actually prove useful to have a man like Khan on board. Go figure. “Och, an’ Khan’s cabin’s finished, at lest. He’ll be movin’ some time th’day, nae idea whin.” Yeah, thanks for the heads-up.

The last message was from Abbey. “Jim, it’s Abbey. I’m so glad that the mission went okay. Doctor McCoy says your injury was a shallow graze and that you should be back in your quarters by now. You’re probably sleeping. Oh, hey, I forgot to tell you, I’ve been talking to Carol Marcus.” Jim set down his glass and listened intently. “She told me she filed for transfer... well, I guess you know that already, since you denied her request. I just wanted to let you know, she won’t be filing again, she changed her mind. But you didn’t hear it from me, okay? Just pretend she never sent you that request, it’ll be easier for everyone. She’s a terrific person, you know? Take care of her, you want to keep her on your ship. Anyway, we can get together for lunch or dinner when you’re feeling better, if you want. Okay, bye.”

Ah, Abbey. One of his many slip-ups from the past couple of weeks. Abbey, Carol, Scotty, Bones... and, at the center of it all, Khan.

Jim ordered a sandwich from the replicator and sat down at the table to eat it alone, then spent the night reading Mobby Dick, unable to get back to sleep.


	29. The Will

The Medbay research labs were busier than usual that morning. Khan was in deep conversation with a young technician, so Jim hung back by the doorway. He knew Khan was aware of his presence; the man didn’t miss anything. When the conversation ended and Khan didn’t approach him, Jim took the least sensible course of action and walked over to the augment who obviously didn’t want to talk to him.

“Hey.”

“ _Captain._ ”

Oh, that tone burned like acid. But Jim wasn’t exactly known for having good survival instincts, so he plunged on. “Your new cabin is ready, huh?”

No reply.

“Can I come visit you some time, see how you’ve fixed up the place?”

“It’s your ship, you can go wherever you want.”

What was _up_ with this man? “Yeah, well, I prefer not to show up in people’s quarters uninvited.” Jim felt eyes on his back and turned around. Half the lab quickly looked down and pretended to be working. “Listen, Khan, can we talk somewhere more... private?”

“Unless you wish to discuss work-related issues, I ask you not to disturb me. I am conducting a delicate experiment at the moment.”

Jim stared, and so did the rest of the lab. “Sure. I’ll, uh, see you around, then.”

\--

Five minutes later, he was knocking on Abbey’s door.

“Come in,” came Lieutenant Ryxkreng’s voice.

The doors slid open to reveal the lieutenant reclining on her bed, PADD in hand, and Abbey sitting at the desk, typing on the terminal.

“Captain, sir,” Ryxkreng saluted him, hurrying to stand up.

“At ease, lieutenant. I’m here to see Doctor Johnson.”

Abbey turned off the terminal screen. “Zee, can you give us a moment?”

“Sure.”

Jim waited awkwardly for Lieutenant Ryxkreng to put on her boots and leave.

“So, uh, you working on your book?” he asked once they were alone.

“Jim, did you tell Khan we had sex?”

Jim did a double-take. “What?”

“Did you?”

“Of course not! I didn’t tell anyone!”

“Well, he knows.”

Oh _fuck_. “Didn’t _you_ tell someone? Maybe a friend? ‘Zee’?” The look Abbey gave him was pure venom. Jim sat down on Ryxkreng’s unmade bed and ran his hands through his hair. “So that’s why he was PMS-ing so badly today.”

“You talked to him?”

“Barely. We fucked up big, didn’t we?”

“Yeah,” Abbey said, leaning so far back in her chair that Jim thought it might snap in half.

He sighed. “Do you think you can... you know, salvage your friendship with him?”

“It’s not just a matter of broken friendships, Jim. This interferes with Khan’s treatment.”

Jim grimaced. He knew first-hand how shitty professional failure felt. “Things have a way of working themselves out, you know. Where there’s a will there’s a way, my mother always says. I’ve made it my life’s motto.”

“Jim, can I ask you something?”

“Sure.”

“But you’ve got to promise you’ll tell me the truth.”

“Okay, what’s up with that? Do I lie so much? Wait, don’t answer that. I’ve told you and Khan so much bullshit I can’t believe it myself.”

Abbey looked down, her voice dropping to a near-whisper. “Jim, you know why Khan is so upset about... us, right?”

Enough lies. Enough beating round the bush. It hadn’t worked for him so far. “Yes.”

Abbey nodded. “Does it make you uncomfortable? Is that why you were hitting on me, why you slept with me? To rub it in his face?”

“I--” He took a deep breath and tried again. “I don’t know, Abbey. I don’t know anything anymore. I’m scared shitless.”

Abbey leaned forward, resting her elbows on her knees. “What’s so scary, Jim? Khan is a respectful man, he’d never make a move on you if it made you uncomfortable.”

“Yeah, well, he did.”

“What?”

“He did make a move on me, Abbey.” He pressed the heels of his hands into his eyes, throwing his head back. “He did and I chickened out.”

“You... chickened out?”

“It’s been driving me up the wall for weeks! He’s a cold-blooded murderer, he killed over seventy of my people, _I_ died because of him. But I keep thinking about him, you know? _That_ way. I can’t get him out of my head.”

When he looked back at Abbey, her face was hidden behind her hands. God only knew what she was thinking. He resisted the urge to punch the bulkhead. Disgust, fear, regret and something more, something unnamable, were coiling at the bottom of his stomach. He was so taut with tension he was on the brink of snapping and breaking apart. And he knew then, this was _it_. His make-it-or-break-it moment with Khan. The stakes were astronomical, but he had to do _something_.

“Abbey, I need your help.”

She sat up and looked at him. “Oh, you need help, Jim, but not from me.”

“No, I need _your_ help, Abbey. You’re the only one who can help me.” Jim slid down from the bed to kneel in front of her. He held her gaze, a hand on each armrest of her chair. “I don’t want to fuck up again. I can’t.”

“What do you want, Jim?”

“I...” He sighed and tried again. “Khan.”

She smiled. “Then go get him. I can’t help you there. Only _you_ can do this.”

“No,” he said, shaking his head. “He’ll kill me.”

“Jim, Khan would give his life for you. I seriously doubt he’d want to kill you.”

“He did try, once.”

“That was a lifetime ago. A life that he wants to forget.”

Jim sat back on his heels, pondering this. “You seriously think he’d give his life for me?”

“I don’t think there’s anything he wouldn’t do for you.”

Jim looked down at the floor and let his sight go out of focus. This ran deeper than he had thought. Surprisingly, that notion didn’t feel as scary as he would have imagined. What he felt, more than fear, more than guilt, more than shame, was relief. There was a will, so there had to be a way.


	30. The Unexpected Turn

It was almost gamma shift when Jim finally gathered up the nerve to knock on Khan’s door. He had skipped dinner in favor of tea and crackers, but he was starting to regret that now. His stomach churned uncomfortably as he announced his presence to the computer. The book in his hand felt impossibly heavy.

“Who is it?”

“It’s me. Jim.”

There was a long, far too long pause where Jim thought Khan wasn’t going to let him in, but eventually the doors parted and he hurried to enter before the augment changed his mind.

The room looked pristine and smelled of oil-based paint and new furniture. It was a standard-sized cabin with a double bunk bed, but only the bottom one had a mattress. Khan was standing by the desk looking more unkempt than Jim had ever seen him, wearing a day-old stubble and a wrinkled T-shirt that looked like it used to be white.

“Hey.”

“Captain,” Khan replied. His eyes flicked briefly to the book in Jim’s hand.

“I, uh... I’m just dropping by to return this.” He pretended to inspect the book’s cover just to avoid Khan’s gaze. “Thank you. For the book, I mean. It was a good read.” Khan reached out to take it and Jim put it in his hand, but didn’t let go. “Can I ask you something?”

“Sheerah was one of us,” Khan said, not letting go of the book either. “An augment.” Jim wasn’t surprised that he had guessed the question correctly; he always did, after all.

“Was?”

“She did not survive stasis aboard the Botany Bay.”

“Oh. I’m... I’m sorry,” Jim said, and hoped the sincerity of his words came across. “Were you two close?”

“We grew up together.” Jim felt the augment’s hold on the book tighten. “She was like a sister to me.”

Jim didn’t deal well with loss himself, much less when it was other people’s. He was stumped for a reply so he said the first thing that came to mind, thinking of what Khan might have left of her beside the book. “Is she buried on Earth?”

It was definitely the wrong thing to say because Khan’s eyes hardened and he turned around, crossing the room in a second, taking the book with him.

“I’m sorry,” Jim hurried to say. “I didn’t mean to offend you. I’m sorry.”

Khan’s shoulders visibly lost some tension then, his head dropping. He took a deep breath, straightened up and said, “There is no grave. Her remains were disposed of as medical waste.”

“What?”

“There was not much left after the experiments, anyway.”

Jim stared. The conversation had taken an unexpected turn and he was skidding off the curve. “Experiments?”

“Records of our creation were lost during the war. No reliable information remained on our genetic sequences, the specifics of our physical and intellectual qualities or the extent of our abilities. I volunteered for the tests that could be performed on a live subject, but several others required the extraction of vital organs.”

Jim shut his eyes against the horrors that Khan’s words conjured in his mind. “And you... volunteered, you say?”

“He was determined to run those tests. I preferred to let the rest of my family sleep.”

‘He’. “Marcus.”

Khan didn’t reply; there was no need.

“He tortured you and he mutilated the bodies of your deceased friends,” Jim said, the words going from his brain to his lips with no filter in between. It sounded so unreal.

“No,” Khan replied. His shoulders tensed up again and he stood even straighter, if that was at all possible. “I did it. I ran the experiments.”

“You _what?_ ”

“I was the only one who possessed the necessary knowledge to perform the autopsies and tests.”

“You mean he made you do it?”

“He gave me a choice. There was always a choice.”

“A choice?” Jim threw his head back and looked at the ceiling, blinking rapidly. “A _choice_? Khan, you had no choice.”

Khan whirled around and advanced on him. “Of course I did!” He was a terrifying sight, even though his voice was broken and his eyes were full of tears. “I _chose_ to go along with it. It was _my_ decision.”

Jim made a conscious effort not to step back. Khan was furious and scared and that was a dangerous combination, but Jim couldn’t bail on him now. Khan needed him. Jim held his gaze and said, “You think that because you said yes, you weren’t forced. But to have a choice you need options. Don’t tell yourself it was your decision, like you had _real_ alternatives. Like you could have refused. I... It took me years to understand this, Khan. Save yourself that torment. You have enough to deal with already.”

Khan studied Jim’s face for a moment. When he made to turn around, Jim put a hand on his shoulder and stopped him. They stood there for a moment, a while, an eternity, Jim looking down at the book in Khan’s hands and Khan looking away, eyes closed.

“I know that this new life is not what you’re used to,” Jim went on, softer now, letting his hand drop from Khan’s shoulder. “You’ve been thrust into it and maybe it’s disappointing, maybe it’s intimidating, I don’t know. Yes, it feels like you’re forever stuck in a place you don’t want to be and there’s nothing you can do about it, but trust me, you can. You _can_ turn your life around and make a new start, _choosing_ your destiny. I did it.”

Khan looked up to face him, eyes searching into his, looking for god knew what. “You... did,” he said, a cross between a question and a statement.

“Yeah. I was always a ‘problem kid’, but after Tarsus things started to go downhill _fast_. I am ashamed of the person I became. Then Christopher Pike found me, somehow.” He shook his head at the irony of talking about it with Khan, of all people, the man who killed Chris. “He dared me to do better than my dad, a challenge I couldn’t back down from, not because I thought I’d make it but because I thought I deserved to fail. So I went and joined the Academy. I didn’t change who I was, mind you. At my core, I’m still an impulsive, risk-taking brat and that’s never going to change. But I made the decision to do a one-eighty and here I am now, the captain of Starfleet’s flag ship, making my own choices. Well, most of the time, anyway. And yeah, I hated the Academy at first, I thought I didn’t belong there but I could see no way out but through. Quitting was not an option.” He shook his head again. “I wasn’t _born_ to be a starship captain, Khan. I worked hard for it and made it happen.”

Khan looked down at the book and turned it around in his hands, inspecting it for several moments, his mind clearly elsewhere.

Jim was not good with silences, though, so he put on a casual tone and changed the subject. “So, what are the underlined words?”

He expected Khan to dismiss his question, or perhaps to ignore it. He didn’t expect him to smile.

“After the war, we spent several days in hiding until we were able to procure a ship. Joachim and Sheerah would have long conversations about their favorite TV shows while I read the only book that I managed to bring with me into exile. If they said a certain word at the exact moment I was reading the same word on the book, I would underline it.” He turned the book in his hands and caressed the edge with a single finger. “It was a pointless pastime, really, but now that Sheerah is gone and Joachim is in indefinite cryogenic stasis, every time I re-read the book I remember pieces of their conversations that would otherwise stay lost in the back of my mind.”

Jim smiled, too. “I wish I had met them.”

“Perhaps you will meet Joachim, some day.”

Jim cringed inside, but didn’t let it show on his face. “Perhaps,” he said, even though he knew Starfleet would never authorize the awakening of the rest of the augments, not while the eugenic wars remained fresh in the collective memory of humans all over the universe. But then again, hope is the last thing you lose, right? “Where there’s a will, there’s a way.”

Khan simply nodded and moved to place the book on the nightstand. “You are welcome to borrow this any time you wish, Captain.”

“Thank you. And it’s Jim.”

The augment turned and held his gaze. “Jim.”

If someone had asked Jim a few weeks ago whether he thought he could become friends with Khan (and they did ask) he would have denied it vehemently, lashing out in indignation (which he did do). Even though they shared quarters, the distance between them back then seemed insurmountable. They had been at each other’s throats half the time, sometimes even literally.

It was mind-boggling to be standing in Khan’s room now, sharing secrets and books. They were friends, there was no other word for it, really. It may not be a typical friendship, but it was a prized one nonetheless. A friendship with the potential to become something more, Jim hoped. “Hey, you got plans for tomorrow night?”

Khan was visibly taken aback. “Plans?”

“I was thinking we could have dinner in my quarters, if you want. For old times’ sake.” Jim fidgeted with his hands; they were starting to sweat.

Khan’s face went back to its default mode: ‘unreadable’. He turned to pull his pajamas from the closet. “Very well,” he said with forced casualness. “Would nine o’clock be all right?”

“Yeah, sure,” Jim replied, puzzled. Why did he suddenly feel like he had turned a corner and found himself in a whole different ship? “Uh, thank you. See you tomorrow.”

Khan continued to pretend being busy with something else so Jim mumbled ‘good night’ and left, not even trying to make sense of Khan’s mood swings. He had a date to plan.


	31. The Full House

Khan was an emotional man, as evidenced by his repeated displays of-- well, emotion. All kinds of emotion, too. Yet he played a tight game of poker with his feelings about Jim, and the only time he had laid his hand on the table (literally, too) Jim had panicked and missed the opportunity. What Jim needed now was a Pair. It was time to grow one.

Ten minutes to nine, the computer announced the arrival of a visitor.

“Open,” Jim said from the bathroom as he finished washing his sweaty hands for the umpteenth time. He couldn’t remember the last time he had been so nervous before a date.

“Jim?”

“Bones?” He peered round the door. “What are you doing here?”

“You missed your appointment.”

“Appointment?”

“For your follow-up. You got shot, _remember_?”

“Oh, right, the follow-up. I’m so sorry I missed it. Can we re-schedule? Tomorrow morning, if you want.”

His friend looked at him up and down. “You’ve got a date, huh?”

“You caught me. Now be a good friend and stop cockblocking me.”

Bones didn’t move. “What are you playing at, Jim?”

“What do you mean?”

“It’s either Johnson or Khan, kid. Make up your mind.”

“What? How the hell did you--” He sighed and ran a hand through his hair. “Never mind. I _have_ made up my mind, Bones. And before you get all affronted on Abbey’s behalf, I talked to her and it’s all cool.”

“Khan’s ‘all cool’, too?”

“Well, we’ll find out tonight, won’t we?”

His friend cringed. “Jim, I always want the best for you, you know that, right?”

“If you’re gonna tell me I’m making a mistake--”

“No,” Bones said, holding up a hand. “But don’t lie to yourself because sooner or later reality will hit you in the face. Hard. You know what kind of man Khan is.”

Jim closed his eyes and nodded. “Yeah, I do.”

“And you know that this thing you’re getting yourself into is not just a one-time, I’ll-leave-my-number-on-the-nightstand-but-never-return-your-calls thing. You don’t get to leave the planet in the morning.”

“Yeah, Bones, that’s pretty clear.”

“And you are aware that--”

“Bones, you’re worried, I get it. I’m worried, too. I bet even Khan is worried. But you gotta let me make my own decisions. I’m not asking you to trust Khan. Just me.” He put a hand on his friend’s shoulder and squeezed. “I really, really want this, and I _know_ I can make it work.”

Bones reached up to pat Jim’s hand on his shoulder. “I trust you, Jim. And I sincerely want this to work for you, if it’s what you want.”

Jim smiled. “Thanks. It is. I know you don’t like Khan--”

“I’ll deal.” He patted Jim’s hand one last time and stepped back. “I’m here for you, you know that. For whatever you need.”

“Yeah.”

“But spare me the icky details, okay?”

Jim grinned. “Oh, I can’t promise that.”

The computer announced another visitor.

“Well, kid, I’ll leave you to it, then. Just one last thing.”

“What?”

“Dr Johnson is back on the market, isn’t she?”

Jim slapped Bones’ back and directed him to the door. “She likes Cardassian Sunrises,” he said, winking for effect.

The doors parted and revealed a black-clad Khan standing outside, now shaved and pristine as ever.

“Good evening,” Bones said, nodding at Khan. Khan nodded back.

“See you tomorrow, Bones.”

“You bet your ass, kid. I’m re-scheduling that follow-up for ten a.m., you’d better not be late.”

Bones stepped out, Khan stepped in and the doors closed. Silence fell in the room. Khan eyed the empty table.

“You hungry?” Jim asked. “We can replicate dinner right now, if you want.”

Khan nodded. Jim moved to the replicator.

This was awkward as hell.

“Don’t just stand there, sit down. Is steak all right? Earth cow steak. I know you’re not a fan of alien meats.”

“Steak is fine, thank you.”

He punched the codes into the replicator. “Wine?”

“I don’t drink alcohol.”

“Oh. Okay.”

Jim poured two glasses of water and started carrying everything to the table. Khan waited until Jim had sat down to start eating.

“So, how are you finding your assignment in Medical?”

“I didn’t realize this was a business meeting.”

Jim let out a nervous laugh. “No, no, we’re way past that point.” At least Khan was aware of what exactly _this_ was. “I’m just interested in... well, you.”

Khan frowned ever so slightly, but the expression was gone in a second. “I’m not a very interesting person at the moment.”

“I beg to differ.”

Jim watched Khan purse his lips, mesmerized by the sight.

“There’s been a considerable breakthrough in the Ankaran retrovirus study,” the augment said. “We managed to isolate the integrase enzyme and map the exact polypeptide chain. It is possible we may reach the development of an effective vaccine by the end of next week.”

“That’s quite the accomplishment.”

“You sound surprised,” Khan said, smirking.

“I’m surprised I haven’t heard anything about this until now.”

“The supervisor assigned to this study wants to keep it quiet until we have the actual vaccine ready. I believe he’s looking to get a promotion from Dr McCoy.”

“Ah, I see. Roberts, right?”

Khan bowed his head in acknowledgement. “You know your crew.”

“You sound surprised,” Jim teased, copying Khan's earlier words.

“I am not. You are an excellent starship captain.”

Jim bit his lip and looked down at his plate, setting about cutting the steak and stuffing his mouth at a faster-than-appropriate speed. Every time Khan complimented his skills as a captain, he felt guilty for some reason. But he didn’t think he could ever tire of it, it was _that_ good. At that thought, his unidirectional second brain immediately supplied ideas for other things about Khan that could be so good he’d never tire of them. He felt his face warm up.

“I wish to apologize,” Khan said suddenly, “for my comments the other day concerning your eating habits.” Jim looked up and caught him staring at Jim’s plate. “Now that I am in possession of more facts, I realize they were out of place.”

Jim shrugged. “Don’t worry about it. You’re not the first and probably won’t be the last. We’re humans, we judge, it’s in our nature.” He picked up the napkin and wiped his hands just to keep them occupied. “I, too, owe you an apology. My behavior toward you has been... unfair, at best. I hope you hold no hard feelings toward me.”

“I do not.”

Jim nodded. He was one step closer, then. But the breach still seemed huge and he couldn’t gather up enough courage to cross it. What a loser. He was a Starfleet captain who had saved the entire planet Earth and bedded pretty much anyone he wanted so far (with the notable exceptions of Spock and Uhura, yeah) and yet here he was now, sitting in front of the man he so desperately desired, unable to confess his feelings. It was ridiculous, really, considering he already knew Khan wanted him back.

What he wanted to say was, ‘it’s been kind of lonely in here these past couple of days, this place just doesn’t feel like home since you’ve been gone’. What came out was, “Do you like your new cabin?”

“It is adequate. I cannot complain.”

Oh.

“Jim... What is it that you wish to tell me?”

“What?”

“You set up this dinner for a reason, did you not?”

“I...” Well, what the hell. “Yeah.” He opened and closed his mouth a couple of times but the rest of the words just didn’t come.

Khan placed his hands on the very edge of the table, as if ready to bolt at a moment's notice. Only the tips of his fingers were visible from where Jim sat. “I truly cannot figure you out,” the augment said, eyes downcast.

“You’re a hard man to figure out yourself.”

Khan looked up. “I expressed my intentions and you made it quite clear that you were not interested. Yet here we are. What is it that you want, Jim?”

Oh, if only Jim could answer. But he was frozen, his mind blank, his heart beating so fast it felt like his chest was about to explode. “I’m sorry,” was all he managed to get past his lips. It was barely a whisper.

Khan winced, actually winced, as if Jim’s words had physically hurt. He pushed himself up and started making his way to the door.

“Wait!” Jim called after him, jumping to his feet like he had been hit by an electric shock.

Unbelievably, Khan actually stopped. His right hand hovered over the door panel, frozen mid-action.

“Let me finish,” Jim said, going round the table until he was standing right behind Khan. “I’m sorry I freaked out,” he whispered. “I’m sorry I don’t know how to handle this.” He lifted his hand, fingers ghosting over Khan’s right shoulderblade. The augment was completely motionless, a statue. “I’m sorry I hurt you.” Jim let his fingers glide over Khan’s shoulder and down his extended arm, reaching the frozen hand and lacing their fingers together. “I just want this so much it terrifies me.”

Khan drew in a sharp breath. His fingers tightened around Jim’s. “If you are looking for--”

“No. I know what you’re going to say, and I’m not. I’m not just looking for a one-night stand or a booty call contact on my communicator. You mean more to me than that.”

If this was difficult for Jim, he couldn’t imagine what it was like for Khan. There was a mounting energy thrumming beneath the augment’s skin, Jim could feel it. Or maybe it was just Jim’s blood rushing through his own veins.

“Are you sure about this?” Khan asked. His voice sounded so different Jim wouldn’t have recognized it in an audio comm. “I don’t wish to be your little... experiment.”

Jim closed his eyes and let his forehead rest on Khan’s back. His clothes smelled of laundry soap. “I’m sure,” he said. “I’m very sure.”

It felt so good, the certainty, the honesty. He couldn’t understand why he had ever been afraid of this. But then Khan let go of his hand and turned to face him, their faces but an inch apart, and Jim’s knees got weak again. Khan lifted a hand to touch Jim’s jawline, placing the slightest pressure under his chin. Jim obediently angled his head up and he might have said something, he wasn’t sure, but next thing he knew Khan’s lips were on his and everything else ceased to matter.

Khan kissed him with his lips only, at first. Then Jim ran his tongue over the augment’s bottom lip and it was like lighting up explosives. Khan grabbed Jim’s shoulders and whirled them both around, thrusting Jim against the closed door. The impact pushed all the air out of Jim’s lungs and when he gasped, Khan took the opportunity to shove his tongue into Jim’s mouth. Jim grabbed the front of Khan’s shirt just to have something to hold on to for the ride.

When they finally pulled apart, Khan’s eyes remained fixed on Jim’s lips.

“I like having you here,” Jim blurted out, nervous under Khan’s stare.

“In your quarters?”

“Yeah. And... here.” He pulled on Khan’s shirt, trying to convey a concept he couldn’t put down in words.

“You can have me here for as long as you want.”

Jim grinned. “I hope that means you’re staying the night.”

Khan just kissed him again.


	32. The Best Adventure Yet (Epilogue)

They didn’t move back in together, no. It didn’t feel very professional, and besides, after the initial feelings of loss were gone and they got back to their usual routines, they realized that this arrangement worked just fine for them. Anyway, living in separate quarters had its advantages. Every dinner felt like a date, every night in felt like a forbidden affair, every late-night return to their respective quarters without getting caught by a crewmember felt like an adventure (even though Jim was pretty sure the whole ship had to know by now).

They were still months away from the end of Khan’s rehab period aboard the Enterprise, finally set by a Starfleet medical board at a total of fifteen months, but Jim was already planning for it. He put in a good word for Khan with Admiral Bowles every other week, and made sure to integrate Khan with the crew, something for which Abbey was infinitely grateful. According to Spock, the probability that Khan would be granted a permanent position as a civilian consultant on board the Enterprise was something like eighty percent (Spock had given a more precise number, of course, but Jim was too excited about it to remember the specifics).

Their relationship had its ups and downs, naturally. They argued far too often about Bones, Jim got pissed every time Khan tried to keep him from going on an away mission he considered too dangerous, and Khan still had those infuriating mood swings. Plus he never let Jim talk him into sharing a few fun (read: alcoholic) drinks, that stuck-up bore.

But the ups far exceeded the downs. The time they spent together was the happiest they both had been in a long, long time. Khan was attentive, passionate, he made Jim feel safe and loved and yes, he _was_ better at everything, if anyone was wondering about the bedroom department.

They went on that vacation to Sahl Two, eventually, when they had to go back for the inauguration of the first dilithium processing plant. They spent a whole afternoon lazing around in the sun and soaking their feet in red water. That was the time Jim told Khan he loved him. It just slipped past his lips. Khan took his hand but otherwise pretended he hadn’t heard. They never talked about it again, and that was okay. It’s not like Jim didn’t know Khan loved him back. He would ask him, someday, make him say it to his face. But not yet.

Having a long-term SO he wanted to keep forever and beyond was a new thing for Jim (for Khan too, it turned out, though Jim had had a hard time extracting that bit of information from the tight-lipped augment). It was an exhilarating experience, on par with discovering new worlds and alien races. Maybe even better, though the jury was still out on that one, mostly because Jim had trouble admitting there was something more thrilling than exploring space. Then again, what was so terrible about confessing his true feelings?

So yeah, it was true. This thing with Khan was definitely proving to be the best adventure yet.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well, what a ride! Personally, I had a fantastic time writing this and hope you enjoyed reading it too.


End file.
